How To Settle An Argument: Write A Novel

Or not.

The Hub and I have an ongoing argument: he thinks I’m a great writer (no argument there) but I’m wasted on poetry because there’s no money in it.  I should write a novel, he thinks.

My argument is, I don’t have a novel in me.  No ideas for a story, no desire to write one, and my reliance on colons and semicolons is such that, although I might do a Cormac McCarthy thing and start a trend, it really helps to sell books if you tell a good story first; then the punctuation, grammar, etc., won’t matter. Just ask Stephenie Meyer.

English: British actor Robert Pattinson at the premiere of Water for Elephants in 2011. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) Gratuitous use of RP’s picture solely for the benefit of Tilly Bud

Write a book, he’s always saying.  Write a book.

Nah, is being my answer (not bad grammar – I’m paraphrasing Love Actually).

Write a book, like it’s that simple.

I’ll tell you what is not simple: listening to the Hub saying the same thing over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and…see how quickly that becomes dull?

We watched Water for Elephants – me for Robert Pattinson; the Hub for the elephant (he’s not keen on Reese Witherspoon).  After the film, I did what I always do after a movie: checked Wikipedia for background details.  I have the internet; the information is freely available: why shouldn’t I be a nerd if I want to?

Guess what?  The film is based on the book of the same name by Sara Gruen, who wrote the first draft as part of NaNoWriMo – National Novel Writing Month.

Here’s another fact, irrelevant to this one, but I always think of it whenever I think of NaNo elephants and it creeps me out so I have to share it: the book Fifty Shades of Grey started life as Twilight fan fiction.  

You can see why that might creep me out, can’t you?  From vampire virgins to young bondage victims (I hear).  Icky.

So…best-selling novels-nagging husbands-vampires-elephants… There could be only one outcome: I’ve signed up for NaNoWriMo.  At best, it will settle the argument once and for all: I do not have a novel in me.  At better, it will settle the argument once and for all: I have a novel in me.  I don’t mind the Hub winning that one if I get a book and film deal out of it.

Now, what shall I call it?  

Water for Vampires…Twilight of the Pattinsons…Fifty Shades of Elephant Grey…

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Related articles

• National Novel Writing Month…am I brave enough? (bcsirrom.wordpress.com)
• National Novel Writing Month (bloggingtonybennett.com)