The Forgotten Kingdom

Today marks the last day of Nano, and if you've been following my word war with Samantha Lafantasie (http://samanthalafantasie.com/) you'll have seen how thoroughly bashed I got very early in the month. What can I say? the woman is a beast when it comes to wordcounts! While her's reached over 60k, mine was a piddly 50,107. But I'm happy to concede victory to her, a woman who I think deserves the win. I will be a graceful loser and give credit where credit is due. For winning I owe her a dinner at Village Inn, which I hope she chooses to be during my christmas break from school so I'll have time for it. Hopefully if she does, and things work out the way I hope they will, I can double it as giving her a little christmas present! 

Now that nano is over I can continue my work on the Violet Chronicles. "Briar Light" is entering its second draft, a draft that I hope is a gigantic improvement on the last one. Draft 2 definitely won't be the last. At least one more draft will be required before I can send it to Samantha for beta-ing, but hopefully it won't take long. It's already not taking nearly as much time as the first draft did for Ruby Curse. That one took nearly two years to get through, but this one was through its first draft in a matter of months.

This month-long break I took for nano was exactly what I needed to recharge my relationship with Violet. Like spending too much time with a good friend, we still may like each other but she and I are the last ones we want to talk to, respectively. But after our break from one another, we're ready to get back to work on yet another round of Violet telling me her story, and me dutifully penning it whilets we sit in my extravagent parlor sipping teas from fine, delicate teacups while Violet is being given dirty looks by the servants. They never say anything to her, though. I suspect its because of the dirty looks she keeps giving them. Tomorrow I've a day busy with errands and then a date with the Prince, so she and I are going to get as much done tonight as we can without leaving me totally exhausted tomorrow. 

So let us bid farewell to nanowrimo for yet another year and return to our not-insane lives for a brief spell, remembering what its like to have the luxury of procrastinating (what I call "researching") and a social life, however infrequent.