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NaNoWriMo is Officially Over
From: www.writerswrite.com

" The Napa Valley Register reports that NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) is officially over now and there is a winner: Mark Hiza.

Thirty days and 713,416,694 words later, National Novel Writing Month is officially over.

NaNoWriMo, as it's known, is November's month-long writing marathon during which writers each attempt a 50,000 word novel. The competition that began in the Bay Area in 1999 as a lark between a small group of friends has grown exponentially each year since then. This month, nanowrimo.org reported that 59,000 people around the world participated in the literary journey, with 9,700 reaching the 50,000 word goal and "winning" the contest. Three of those 59,000 scribes are right here in Napa.

Napan Mark Hiza has "won" his second NaNoWriMo, finishing with 50,104 words, and earning an official nanowrimo winner certificate. His novel, "The Long Journey," begins with a blast:

"Another day starts with a salvo of gunshots, a deafening noise so regularly heard that most people in this neighborhood of mixed two-story brownstones use it as an alarm clock." Hiza's novel continues, telling the story of an encounter between a mysterious Italian woman and an inner-city emergency room doctor.

"Diana Ossana, Larry McMurtry's writing partner, read the story in The New Yorker shortly after it was published eight years ago and urged Larry to read it. They both wanted to make a film from it even though the material was strong and risky. They optioned the story from their own pockets, most unusual for screenwriters. I was doubtful that it actually would get to the big screen, and, in fact, it took years before it did."

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"Excuse me, but it is NOT a story about 'two cowboys.' It is a story about two inarticulate, confused Wyoming ranch kids in 1963 who have left home and who find themselves in a personal sexual situation they did not expect, understand nor can manage. The only work they find is herding sheep for a summer ? some cowboys! Yet both are beguiled by the cowboy myth, as are most people who live in the state, and Ennis tries to be one but never gets beyond ranch hand work; Jack settles on rodeo as an expression of the Western ideal. It more or less works for him until he becomes a tractor salesman. Their relationship endures for 20 years, never resolved, never faced up to, always haunted by fear and confusion. How different readers take the story is a reflection of their own personal values, attitudes, hang-ups. It is my feeling that a story is not finished until it is read, and that the reader finishes it through his or her life experience, prejudices, world view and thoughts. Far from being 'liberal,' Hollywood was afraid of the script as were many actors and agents. Of course I knew the story would be seen as controversial. I doubted it would even be published, and was pleased when The New Yorker very quickly accepted it. In the years since the story was published in 1997 I have received many letters from gay and straight men, not a few Wyoming-born. Some said, 'You told my story,' some said 'That is why I left Wyoming,' and a number, from fathers, said 'Now I understand the hell my son went through.' I still get these heart breaking letters."

"Yet more members of the Gay Gestapo have reamed me out for not all-out supporting Brokeback Mountain. Jeez, this really is turning out to be some sort of politically powered pooftah burning. Do you think I can get George Clooney to make a documentary about my right to free speech?"

European publishers warned Tuesday that they cannot keep allowing Internet search engines such as Google Inc. to make money from their content. "The new models of Google and others reverse the traditional permission-based copyright model of content trading that we have built up over the years," said Francisco Pinto Balsemao, the head of the European Publishers Council, in prepared remarks for a speech at a Brussels conference. His stance backs French news agency AFP, which is suing Google for pulling together photos and story excerpts from thousands of news Web sites.

"It is fascinating to see how these companies 'help themselves' to copyright-protected material, build up their own business models around what they have collected, and parasitically, earn advertising revenue off the back of other people's content," he said. "This is unlikely to be sustainable for publishers in the longer term."

First published in Glamour magazine in October, "Guy" is a wish-fulfillment fantasy that explores a married woman's life had she chosen a different path. A search for a writer to adapt the story is under way.

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Weiner wrote the bestsellers Good in Bed, In Her Shoes, Little Earthquakes and Goodnight Nobody. Shoes was made into a Fox 2000 film directed by Curtis Hanson and starring Cameron Diaz, Shirley MacLaine and Toni Collette. It was released in October. Weiner has Earthquakes in development at Universal, and Benderspink, which reps Weiner, is packaging "Nobody" to shop to studios early next year.

"It feels to me like it's a big trick. You come here," Black says, referring to Los Angeles, "for magic, and you get snake oil instead. It has all the glittery lights, and it's very bright. It's like a big, grinning idiot of a city. It beckons you and then just doesn't deliver."

"It's not the edge of the rainbow, but it's certainly the edge of the continent," he says of Los Angeles. "It's the last bastion of the American dream, the place where hurt people come, the place where failed people come, hoping to be fixed and loved, hoping that this city - this magic place - will afford them the kind of opportunity they didn't have elsewhere, to find redemption. ... I still believe that in the barrenness of L.A. there is magic. I wouldn't live there if I didn't."