National Novel Writing Month 2011 - Winner!

I was a winner for National Novel Writing Month 2011, meaning that I managed to write a novel of at least 50,000 words during the month (November). I completed it, at least the rough draft, on November 21, 2011, but didn't get the word count verified by the website until the next day. The Open Office word processor, which I wrote it in, put the word count at 60,973, and the website put the word count at 60,977. This was quite a bit higher than 2010's novel, which had word counts of 53,076 and 53,077, and 2009's novel, which had word counts of 52,110 and 52,111. The book for 2011 was a sequel of the 2010 and 2009 ones. I joined National Novel Writing Month [ nanowrimo.org ] on March 20, 2009, as user Stephen_M_99.

Less winner web badge images were available this year, and they were more uniform in appearance. If forced to make a choice, I would probably choose the wide one at the top, though the long one under it is also good.









My novel is science fiction, and though I did not put a synopsis or excerpt in the Novel Info section this time, here they are for this post:

Synopsis:
The time traveler-in-training's life takes a sudden drastic turn, and though he learns much more about time travel, it's not enough to keep an old enemy from confronting him in a most disturbing way.


Excerpt:
Outside the room, he heard screams and commotion. That was odd. He normally didn't hear anything from outside while he was in the room. He turned and saw a big hole in the wall, with glowing, burning edges. He remembered he had seen it before, when it was forming. Outside it was the hallway. As he looked, someone rushed past. He heard a rumble, and then a distant screech of twisting metal, and the room shook. There was a muffled whump and a glow went down the hallway, then faded, and he felt a pressure wave go through him. There were more screams.

He went to the hole in the wall, and careful not to touch the hot edges, put his head through and looked out. In the direction of where the glow had come from, he could see a strange, churning, blue-gray mass, still softly glowing. In the other direction he could see a few people, men and women, going toward a door, gathering around it, trying to squeeze through it, everyone at once, which wasn't working out. Maybe it was an exit. He quickly but carefully stepped through the hole, and rushed toward them.

As he reached them, the last one was going through the door. The person, a man, looked back and saw him. His eyes widened, and he started to push the door closed. Jack pushed back, putting his shoulder to the door, and for a moment the door opened wider. Jack saw then, through the window in the door, that some of the others had seen what was happening, and turned back to help. Despite Jacks' efforts, the door started to slowly close. "Please," Jack said, "I just want to get out."

"I'm sorry," one of them said. "We can't take the risk. You're one of the actual operatives. We're just low level workers. No one cares about us. If you came, though, we'd become a target." The door inched closed, then, and he could hear the click of a lock. He tried the knob, tried desperately to turn it, but it was no use. He watched them through the window in the door, as they left, moving quickly away, some of them turning back occasionally to look at him. Jack yelled and pounded on the door, but it was no use.

A gray-blue glow started to softly fill the hall, and a ripple flowed through it, seemingly through reality itself. Jack pulled frantically on the knob, as if he was trying to pull the whole door out of its frame, as the walls slowly faded away.



The previous years' novels:

National Novel Writing Month 2010 - Winner!
National Novel Writing Month 2009 - Winner!