The other night, I was thinking about rewriting an old NaNo novel, and I was starting to think about how I would go about it, then I started talking to Ninja Muse, and all of a sudden the main character walked into my head, with a past, a future, and everything.

While he's nothing like Eli at all, the way he walked into my head was just like the way Eli did. "Hey, I'm here and I'm WAY more interesting than that character you were about to write. Trust me. Look..." He  then proceeded to flood my brain with all sorts of awesome images, bits of story, conversations and all. He has no issue with talking straight to me and telling me how things should go.

First, a HUGE bit of the plot that I was going to include had to go. It wasn't something that HE would do at all, so it had to go. Okay, major plot point gone... but it had to be replaced with something... and what he came up with was WAY better than what I had in mind. I passed it by Ninja Muse, and she agreed that it was a LOT better with the new plot.

Right now, it's a bit of a mess of notes, bits of outline, and post it notes, but there's a story there, and after struggling trying to find something, anything to write for the past few months, I've finally found the right story.

The weird thing is that I started in the exact same frame of mind as I started Eli's novel with. I picked up that old NaNo novel and thought "well, I'll give rewriting this a go again, if I fail at it, oh well." Just like with Eli, the new character came in and said: "this is a better idea."

I've had enough practice now to know better than to argue with characters (and Ninjas when they tell me that it could be better). The weird thing was that this character was entirely connected to his name. Once his name was in place, everything else fell into place.

So what does this have to do with Bieber? Well, yesterday, I was walking through the mall, thinking about this novel, when I started getting ALL SORTS of ideas. Like, MUST WRITE NOW!!! Kinds of ideas. I was just thinking about the general ideas of the story, while on my way to Borders to get coffee and to see if I could find some biographical books about certain people (no luck) when it was rapid fire ideas. The character decided to talk, and I had to listen. I went through all three floors of the mall looking for paper to write on. By coincidence, I had a pen in my pocket.

I started where I thought I'd have the most luck-- Papyrus since they sold cards and things. I figured I could get a little notepad, then sit in the food court and make notes until the character stopped talking. The ONLY paper that Papyrus had for sale was an incredibly pink, incredibly shiny notebook that was about $12. Too much, so I moved on to Hot Topic, thinking that they had to have some kind of journal thing. No luck there at all! I think I actually said out loud "what the hell? How can whiny emo kids be whiny emo kids without journals to write in?!" I went to Newbury Comics where I repeated the process. Running out of options, I went to Claires. They did in fact have something with paper in it.

Dreams sold separately.

My Justin Bieber Dream Diary to be precise. I ALMOST bought it. I was three seconds from buying it (and from my brain exploding goo all over the mall). I lucked out and found a different notebook. It's flowery, but not My Justin Bieber Dream Diary bad.

I went home and told David about this. David then disappeared for hours. He came home and said "Don't look, I have a surprise for you!" I closed my eyes and when I opened them:

SURPRISE!!!

Justin Bieber has now become the mascot for my new novel. David had to go to five stores, since he had no clue where to buy Justin Bieber stickers (FYE in the mall, after striking out at Walmart, Target, iParty, and Toys R Us). Apparently, I should have bought the My Justin Bieber Dream Diary to write this novel in according to David. Maybe I'll get one next time I'm in that mall again.

I think my main character would like his story being written in a Justin Bieber Dream diary. Just for the record, Eli would be APPALLED, so despite their similar origins, they're very, very different. In fact, this character is very, very different than any character I've ever written. They should ALL be like that, but sometimes, there's some overlap. They all tend to be gay after all.

For now, his story is getting written in a flowery pink, orange, and green notebook with the sticker of Justin Bieber on the inside cover with the words "Bieber is WATCHING YOU!" under it. Bieber looks as menacing as a cute, tween heartthrob can, and he does kind of look like he's writing me write. My main character doesn't care about this, and he kind of likes the flowery notebook, so it's working pretty well. Well, it will be once I get past this brainstorming bit and get to the actual writing.

Which I should do now.

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