It's dead, Jim.

Time for an update, I guess. My NanoNovel this year, Waking the Sky, is dead. As in shredded to pieces and fertilizing the compost in my mind. I knew there was a chance this would happen going into it, but I promised myself I'd stick it out... at least until I saw Avatar and it confirmed my fears.

I still like my characters, and I still like parts of my basic scenario, but there are too many points of similarity between what I was writing and a certain popular movie by James frickin' Cameron and they're too embedded into the plot for me to extract them and not kill the patient.

Oh well. Back to the drawing board. I'll bring Hector Crade and his crew of kamikaze filmmakers back for another try later this year, and I've already started stirring a few ideas around on how to do it. My main goal this year is to write something marketable, moreso than my two unpublished and probably unpublishable Majadan novels. While I get that back up to speed, I'll spend the time on some short fiction.

I've got a story now that seems to be turning into a novella (or at least a novelette) set in the same post-apocalyptic solar system as the short story I currently have sitting with the judges at the Writers of the Future contest. I'll be sure and let you know how that goes to.

Ah well. The book is dead. Now that I admit that, I can admit that I never really liked it much anyway. Love the characters, though. They'll be back.