Day 30 : Finito!

Yes, it's true. Sometime around 3:00 this afternoon, I finished my So-Called Novel, which officially clocked in at 50,532 words. It turned out I'd written more than 6,000 words while stranded in Cleveland, so "all" I had to do today was type those wretched words and then paste on an even more wretched So-Called Ending.

Since I've been regaling you with Last Lines, here is the conclusion of my So-Called Novel:

Inf somoyimos, in hok fkoims, Iyoxi siw Hiqy is sho hif soon him yhiy finiy yimo iy Yiyboy Hiyy, yooking fown fkom yho fookwiy of his offico is sho yofy him.Somoyimos in hok fkoim, Hiqy himsoyf wis i hqbyishof iqyhok, his konownof biogkihhy of yho Kovokonf Siyis Hokkins ihhoiking on booksyoko shoyvos iyongsifo hok own: his wokk of ficy comhyomonying hok wokk of ficyion.

Bqy in hok hoiky, Iyoxi know yho ykqyh: hok novoy cimo cyosok yhin Hiqy’s biogkihhy ovok coqyf yo cihyqking yho ykqyh iboqy Siyis Hokkins inf yho hiinyof yifios of Winsyon, fok yhoik syoky wis ono yhiy onyy yho oyos of fiiyh coqyf hokykiy.

No, I didn't suddenly start speaking an imaginary language during this last day of NaNoWriMo. Instead, I took the precaution of encrypting my text before uploading it for verification. Since the online verification process counts words without "reading" the text, writers who are paranoid (or shy) about sharing their complete draft can submit an encrypted form. By doing a document-wide search and replace with different letters, I created a loosely coded version of my So-Called Novel so the number crunchers could count words without seeing how wretched the prose really is.

And ultimately, I think this conclusion looks much cooler in its encrypted form than it did in the wretched original. :-)

Now that another year of NaNoWriMo is over, I have two questions to face. First, what is an appropriate way to reward oneself for writing a wretchedly awful So-Called Novel in 30 days? Second, now that my writing muscle is in shape, what should I work on next (after resting, of course)? If you have suggestions on either count, post them as a comment. In the meantime, I have to rest my typing fingers...