This past weekend, I spoke at the Crossroads Writers Conference in Macon, Georgia. I’ll presumably get to a full recap eventually (wherein I explain a weekend where I encountered people like: my first nervous fan, a former dominatrix, Delilah Dawson with her 1989 cell phone, Nathan “Baby Goose” Edmondson, Robert “Not-An-Accessory-To-Murder” Venditti, and various other awesome humans).
I also met Chris Baty, who is of course the big brain behind NaNoWriMo.
Now, I have my reservations about NaNoWriMo (which I pronounce “wree-mo,” as in, “NaNoWriMo Williams, The Adventure Begins”, even though it is, I’m told, technically “wry-mo”). I think like with all “get-thee-to-the-writery” initiatives, it’s a perfect fit for some and for others an anchor around their ankles, so you just gotta know what’s right for you and what works and not blame yourself when what’s really going on is you’re just adhering to a process that isn’t really your process.
Square peg, circle hole, and all that.
So, that being said, I also know that National Novel Writing Month gets a helluva lot of you up off your leafy, moldering bed of sadness and shame — and anything that forces you to shake off the barnacles and get your ass out to sea is good by me. (Actually, Baty had a good Grace Hopper quote comparing writers to seafaring vessels: “A ship in port is safe… but that’s not what ships are built for.”)
Anyway.
So, first up, I figure I’ll ask: who’s doing NaNoWriMo?
Have you done it before? What was your experience?
What are your hopes and reservations for doing it again?
Also — here’s a list of ten posts here at terribleminds that maybe, just maybe, will help you start to prep for the coming tide of furious frenzied cram-a-holic novel-writing come the month of November.
25 Things You Should Know About NaNoWrimo
25 Things You Should Know About Writing A Novel
25 Things To Do Before Starting Your Next Novel
25 Ways To Plot, Plan, And Prep Your Story
25 Things You Should Know About Story Structure
25 Things To Know About Writing Your First Chapter
25 Ways To Fight Your Story’s Mushy Middle
And, finally:
Now, you may also know that I have a number of writing books available.
This month and next I’ll be offering a couple specials on said books, should that tickle your most private of private parts. And of course, I hope that it does. *tickle tickle*
The two specials for the month of Rock-Out-With-Your-Cocktober-Out are:
THE NUMBERLY BUNDLE
You can buy the PDFs of:
250 Things You Should Know About Writing
500 Ways To Be A Better Writer
500 More Ways To Be A Better Writer
and 500 Ways To Tell A Better Story
For just $7.50 (normally, it’d be $10).
This only works if you buy direct, please note, by using the link below.
Or, you may instead want:
THE PENMONKEY INITIATIVE
If you procure both Confessions Of A Freelance Penmonkey and Revenge Of The Penmonkey during the month of October, I’ll send you one of my other writing books (i.e. any of the above 250 or 500 “lists of 25” books) for free. That does not require direct procurement from me. Here all you need to do is email me proof of purchase to terribleminds at gmail dot com and let me know what book you and and, boom, I’ll send you the link to download. Dig? Dug.
Thanks, all, looking forward to hearing from you crazy ink-mad story-devils.
Dunx says:
I am doing NaNoWriMo. This will be my ninth year, in fact. I have won every year since 2004.
I use it for exactly the reason you state. The mouldering bed of sadness is comfortable and familiar, but I have to get out of it and write: other things occupy my time too easily, so having writing be the actual focus of the month is what works for me.
Things that don’t work for me are mostly around chopping between projects. I’ve spent many of Novembers working on the same project (all new words, just different phases of rewrite) which is, officially, cheating – but I need to use the energy to work on the Big Story. Last year was a different book and I am glad I wrote it, but this year is back to finishing up the main WIP.
And my experience has generally been pretty good. I’ve only had two years where it was actually hard to finish – once where I didn’t follow the process I needed and ended up telling the wrong story, and once where I lost my job halfway through the month – but I like the communal sense of NaNoWriMo.
I’m going to be writing about it a lot at my blog. Today’s post is about my workflow in November.
October 8, 2012 — 9:00 AM
Tymber Dalton says:
I always thought it was “wree-mo,” too, so don’t feel bad.
I’ve tried a couple of times to do Nano, but the problem is, I’m usually too busy writing to…eh, write. LOL First with non-fiction, and now with my fiction. I only have limited hours in each day (where’s my time machine, dammit) and I have my schedule set up where I just flat-out don’t have time for “fun” writing. (I mean, it’s really fun getting a paycheck every quarter, so I enjoy my writing anyway LOL.)
I envy the people who can do it for the sheer fun of it. I’m already on a crazy enough schedule that it’s not uncommon for me to knock out 30k+ words a week, on top of edits for stuff in my publisher’s queue already.
This is the same kind of (cough*batshitcrazy*cough) mentality I had when Hubby finally talked me into taking time out from my non-fiction writing back in 2007 to focus on my fiction. I didn’t want to spend time “playing” when I needed to be “working.” I’m a Taurus, I can’t help it. We obsess (cough*allthetime*cough) frequently about balancing “work” and “play.”
Working at home is great, but the bane is I will work ALL the time if I don’t force myself (or if Hubby doesn’t force me) to take a break. Unlike jobs in the past where at the end of the day, home I went and I was “done.”
So I’ll be rooting for all the Nanowrimos out there who stick with it (or at least try to). I do envy you, believe it or not. LOL
October 8, 2012 — 9:43 AM
Kate Haggard says:
Kind of sort of doing it. Got an extra long project on the table, so will use it to thrust through the second half of the first draft. Maybe finish another unfinished draft that got away from me. Although I mostly like cheering on the other people doing it since November likes to explode in my face.
Going to play it fast and loose from the sidelines this time around.
October 8, 2012 — 9:45 AM
Paul Baxter says:
First, if you’re serious about writing, you’ll never spend a better $7.50 than on Chuck’s Numberly Bundle.
Second, I now need to write The Mouldering Bed of Sadness. Thanks, Dunx!
October 8, 2012 — 10:04 AM
Ashley says:
I’m doing it for the… sixth time? Yes. (Though if we count the two Camp NaNo’s over the summer, then eighth.) The SHUT UP AND PAY ATTENTION thing really works for me, but — it wasn’t enough to get me to finish a draft. Nope. The big thing was that when I moved here, there was actually an active NaNo group that did write-ins.
So in 2010, scared to death of every other person, I finished my first draft of my novel. And I’ve finished everything I’ve started with this group since, because we’ve got chemistry. So, NaNo is, if nothing else, a great way to meet and test out other writers in your area.
October 8, 2012 — 10:09 AM
Mieke Zamora-Mackay says:
This will be my fourth year participating in NaNoWriMo. I won last year. We’ll see how it goes this year.
NaNoWriMo can be the force some writers need to push their words out. It was that way for me last year. Hopefully it will help me out again this year.
October 8, 2012 — 10:10 AM
Squishy says:
My three years of NaNoWriMo taught me how to write a first draft (and also, how much I love writing). However, my goal is no longer the first draft, it’s the second draft, and “reckless abandon” is not the method I wish to take for that.
Though I’m not participating this year, I encourage all writers to try NaNoWriMo at least once. Unless you intend on sending your NaNoMS to publishers/agents come December. Then, no. Just stop. STOP.
October 8, 2012 — 10:24 AM
Steven Chapman says:
It certainly is a firecracker up the arse, the trouble is people like to say the month is so hectic that they need a break when it’s all over and done with. As if this is writing is a once a year event and they can pack up their notebooks and forget about it for the other eleven months.
I’ve heard people complaining about having to meet a word count “1667 words a day! That’s impossible!” which may be true for them but really worries me how they get there work done if they think that’s a hefty daily word count!
I will be doing it but I’m mainly taking part for the coffee house meets up and piss ups that will happen during the month. Interacting with other bat shit crazy writers is what NaNoWriMo is all about for me.
October 8, 2012 — 10:33 AM
Beth L. says:
I had originally planned to do NaNo again this year, after doing it on a dare last year. I even went so far as to do a little harmless and perfectly legal outlining. I really enjoyed the experience last year and even wound up with the first draft of a novel I had been thinking about but never quite gotten a start on. The time pressure is great for making you just get the story out there on paper. Then somehow in the midst of all of the calm planning this year, a Story Idea arrived that was completely different and utterly entrancing, and I got a cool 50k words down between Sept 12 and Oct 5. This may have been the fates looking out for me because it seems like both the first and the last week of November are going to be pretty insane. I think I may just label the past weeks “NaNo came early” and cheer from the sidelines this year.
October 8, 2012 — 10:41 AM
Angel Collins says:
I’m doing it. The last year I did it was 2008. I won that year. This is the first year I can bring myself to relive that wonderfully terrible experience. I can already feel my fingertips burning. The only reason I didn’t finish before is I have trained myself not to write and I want to use NaNoWriMo to begin rectifying that habit. Also, not that things in my life are very different and I’m in a new stage in my life, I feel that I want to train myself to buckle down. Which means I am spending October pre-training. Plan on me paypalling you for those numberly books. Also, I’ve said it a million times, it was great meeting you at Crossroads.
October 8, 2012 — 10:47 AM
CE_Loveless says:
I attempted it last year, and failed miserably. But this year I was convinced by a new friend I made to.try it again. I figure it might do better with some support and somebody to swap chapters with.
October 8, 2012 — 10:56 AM
Casz Brewster says:
Ah, NaNoWriMo. That month that brings this romantic hue to being a writer. I like it. I support it and the energy behind it. I’ll be doing it again. This will be my 7th year. I didn’t “win” two of the years. But, during those years I had significant life events that prevented me from finishing a 50k novel in 30 days (emergency surgery and a child being hospitalized). However, this will be my last year. I’ve proven to myself that I can do it. Now, I need to turn that type of discipline (which I believe I have) into my daily life and sell the shit I’ve written. Not to say its all shit. ;p
However, I’ve also dragged a bunch of writing ships out to sea with me and have the masthead of municipal liaison for Twin Peaks. I’m hopeful to inspire other writers this November, and hand off the Captain epaulettes to a new ML this year. I knew it was time to move away from doing NaNoWriMo when Baty decided to leave. At some point you have to move forward. I have 3/5 novels that now need finishing/polishing (one is almost done and by the end of this week may take flight for its first inquiry and one that has been shelved because no one seemed to want it). I have two others I should likely finish. So my Novembers from now on will be devoted to those types of goals. Will I ever come back to it? Perhaps. But, I won that battle, got the banners and stickers and what not. NaNo did teach me that networking and connecting and interacting with other writers was important. So important, I established a very solid writing community in my little Cascade Foothills valley. So, I look at NaNo with fondness because it was like this little cheerleader that told me I could, gave me inspiration and new ideas and created a very, very strong artist community in my home town. For that I’m grateful. Yet, after this year, I’ll be accepting new challenges and moving on.
October 8, 2012 — 11:01 AM
tiakall says:
The Nanowrimo FAQ says ‘wry-mo’ and ‘ree-mo’ are both accepted, so you’re fine. 😀
Done/won Nano since 2004, and it is really the thing that got me writing. I’ve done 20-something projects since then – some were decent sort-of fanfic that I put up on my site, some are terrible and locked away forever, some have good points but problems that I haven’t figured out how to fix (my achilles heel!) So this year, I’m going to try and rewrite two that I think I’ve figured out the solutions for and hopefully get polishable drafts out of them.
I think it’s something everyone should try at least once – just like it’s worth your while to try and outline (if you’re a pantser) or pants (if you’re an outliner) a novel, to try and write outside your genre, etc. It’s great for getting people to just write. You don’t have to publish it – you don’t have to even want to be published, ever. (As I recall, only about thirty-something percent want to be published at some point.)
October 8, 2012 — 11:19 AM
Amber J. Gardner says:
I was your first?! Well damn. At least I was memorable XD
I’m doing it. Mostly to just keep me writing. Also because I feel like I HAVE to now since a NaNoWriMo volunteer got me to the Conference to begin with. I feel like I owe them now.
I think it’s great if you know how to use it YOUR way. For me, it was a great ultimatum. If I can’t do this, there’s no way I can be a writer. It’s great for making a person make the jump and commit to something and not get away with not showing up.
It’s not so much about writing the novel, than it is about being committed.
At least, that’s how it went for me.
October 8, 2012 — 12:14 PM
terribleminds says:
@Amber —
You were actually not the fan in question! This fan was like, literally shaking when she met me, which almost made me laugh — not to dismiss her but more because, holy crap, why would anyone get that excited to meet ME?!
— c.
October 8, 2012 — 12:20 PM
Amber J. Gardner says:
Oh thank god. That means I wasn’t as nervous as I thought I appeared when we first met. Or rather, someone outdid me! Whoo!
October 8, 2012 — 12:48 PM
Amber J. Gardner says:
Nothing wrong with that, of course. Rather, awesome that there are others who are nervous, great fans of yours. I’m not alone!
October 8, 2012 — 12:51 PM
Sporkdelis says:
I am not doing Nano this year. I have done it three or five times if you count camp nano. I’ve won legitimately once. the one time I won it was such a horrible piece of suck (and would need at least another 100,000 words to finish the sad homunculous it had become) that it was abandoned. I might do it again, but I don’t really care about winning, it’s just a goal making machine.
October 8, 2012 — 12:57 PM
Shiri Sondheimer says:
I’ve never done NaNo and don’t plan to this year, but for those it works for, I think it’s great and I wish all of you the best of luck!
October 8, 2012 — 1:08 PM
Lynna Landstreet says:
I finally did it for the first time last year, after several years of intending to but losing my nerve, and it worked out really well for me. It seems that having set word count targets to meet, and some form of external accountability (as in, other human beings who will notice whether and how much I am writing), really helps as a motivator. I made the 50,000 word goal – and I actually still like most of what I wrote! Mind you, 50,000 words didn’t bring me anywhere close to finishing my novel, and while my pace slowed considerably after that, I’m now at (checks total) 93,582, which is more than I’ve ever written on anything, to the best of my knowledge.
I’ve gotten bogged down a bit due to life overload plus being caught in the dreaded “mushy middle”, while at the same time being aware that this thing may be getting way too long (because if you’re approaching 100,000 words, and are still near the middle of your story, this is likely a danger sign), but I really want to get it finished.
So I think I’m going to be a “NaNo Rebel” this year – as in, do NaNo, but outside the official rules, meaning in this case that I’ll be continuing work on the same project. My goal this time: either another 50,000 words, or get the damn thing finished, whichever happens first.
Well, “finished” in the sense of getting the first draft finished. I’m well aware that I’ll have a ton of editing and revising and what not to do after that…
October 8, 2012 — 1:20 PM
Cherith says:
I’d done NaNo a number of years, though I took last year off. I’ve won some and not finished in others. One year, I was barely two weeks in and just stopped. It happens. The challenge is not really the writing for me- I write all the time- but the consistency and the motivation to stick with one story for fifty-thousand words.
I already have a story in mind for this year. I’ve made notes and have a really sort of basic outline so that come November 1st if I’m up for it, I can start writing. We’ll see if that works.
October 8, 2012 — 1:22 PM
Mike (@NewGuyMike) says:
I find that trying to pants a whole novel gets me all mushed up at the end of act one and it flounders.
I’m going to be turning November into NaFiTFucThiMo … National Finish The Fucking Thing Month. Again. Maybe it’ll work out this year. Only one act left in my in progress novel so I’m cautiously optimistic.
October 8, 2012 — 2:05 PM
Bronson O'Quinn says:
This is the first year I’ll be trying it and I’m excited! I kind of already know what I’m going to write on and I’ve signed on to do daily blog posts, too, with some other writers. And I’ll probably be cooking Thanksgiving dinner all by myself, too. Yay!
October 8, 2012 — 2:13 PM
Thomas Delano says:
This will be my second year attempting NaNoWriMo. I started it last year, and did relatively alright for somebody who’s only really worked with flash/short fiction and poetry, but I didn’t hit the word goal. However, I’ve got a longer piece I’ve been working on for a couple months now that I plan to continue on throughout November and hopefully hit that mark. I’ve been doing my best to not have any excuses for why it can’t be done this year, as I know that busier people with more time-demanding careers (read: non-English students) will be working on it as well. Best of luck to everyone, and thank you Chuck for the Numberly Bundle! Looking forward to reading it all. 🙂
October 8, 2012 — 2:15 PM
Linds says:
I did NaNoWriMo for the first time in 2010 and “won” in the sense that I wrote the first 50k of my first complete story. It was nice proof that I could do it. That first half of the novel though, to be honest wasn’t necessarily the best writing compared to the second half. Looking back, I think I write ‘best’ at a slighter lower pace of about 30-40k a month.
Although I haven’t participated in the traditional sense since, I seem to line up to start writing a new story around NaNo time every year anyway. So I could do NaNo this year if I wanted and finish off the story I just started, but I find for myself, I’d likely end up cutting a lot out later (NaNo encourages my verbose writing ninjas like that).
October 8, 2012 — 2:58 PM
jeffo says:
Can’t say for sure if I’ll be doing it or not – depends on where I am with revisions for my WiP.
I did NaNo two years ago and it was great. It got me moving, and the ‘pressure’ to complete the 50K goal got me to shake that tyrant, Internal Editor. Of course, I rushed the ending in order to ‘finish’, so it was not very good, but it rolled right into the next something, which was a heck of a lot better (and did get finished, all the way through).
October 8, 2012 — 3:13 PM
Jenna says:
I’ve been doing it off and on since 2003, have won it three times and published two of the novels. I also did Camp Nanowrimo this summer and have a completed rough draft that I need to finish editing.
While I’ve never gone to the write-ins or parties in my area (other people! what madness is this!) I’ve found the collective energy to be very inspiring. The problem has been that for the last few years as I’ve tried to establish my professional career, I’ve written so much during the rest of the year that by November, I’m pretty much worded out, especially for anything long and involved.
So while I’ve got an idea for this year and plan to do it, editing comes first (December deadline) and if I don’t hit 50k come November, I don’t mind much.
October 8, 2012 — 3:25 PM
inkgrrl says:
Doing NaNo this year to either a) rewrite my alternate Pompeii murder mystery from the ground up, or b) jam through a sexy paranormal treasure hunt that wants writing. Either way I won’t be following the NaNo rules to the letter, but either way I’ll get at least 50K written so either way I win.
October 8, 2012 — 4:20 PM
Sally says:
This will be my fourth year doing NaNoWriMo (seriously, do you wreet? or do you wryte? 🙂 and I’ve won all three years, though I’ve flopped after a single day of ScriptFrenzy or Camp NaNoWriMo. Last year was the hardest for me, actually, in that I had one day where I was literally typing with my eyes closed because I was so exhausted I couldn’t actually keep them open and had to start an “epilogue” or prologue to a sequel because I just didn’t have an ounce left of the story in me at the time.
My biggest helpful hint is to try not to get behind if possible, because make-up days are exhausting, and to back up! I lost about 100 pages when my computer died, and while I ultimately got them back, I might not have been so lucky. It was horrible.
I’m always suprised how awesome it makes me feel to do NaNoWriMo. I work retail, so Nov is a pretty exhausting month to begin with. But, if nothing else, it teaches me that I can actually do this. Now I just need to find an editing month that can break it down for me that simply! 🙂
October 8, 2012 — 4:59 PM
Christopher Robin Negelein says:
I guess I should take this as a point of pride, but since you have to start off “fresh” for NaNoWriMo, I’ve never been eligible to participate.
I’d have to pull up stakes and begin anew. And if I’m more than three chapters in, that isn’t happening.
October 8, 2012 — 5:37 PM
Todd Moody says:
I was successful on my first try in 2010, and I’ll be using that as the kernel for my Master’s Thesis if I get into the program I’m hoping for. I’ll find out in a a few weeks. I’ll tear it down and rebuild it, I love the idea behind it.
Last year I didn’t win, but I was extraordinarily busy that month and only made a half-hearted effort. I made too many changes to the concept late in the game and that didn’t help any. I went back recently and reread what I had and it wasn’t bad, and it might work as a novella or a lead in short story for my 1st novel.
This year I am ready to start a new project and have been outlining and fleshing out characters in advance, so I expect to win this year and be on my way to my second finished novel. It might be weird in the aftermath, working two books simultaneously to conclusion. I know some people prefer to have multiple projects going at the same time, and I imagine you are one of the those Chuck.
October 8, 2012 — 5:40 PM
Anthony Elmore says:
I made it to 38k in 2009. I use NANOWRIMO to either close projects or to start new ones. I should be done with my MG novel by the end of the month. I’ve got two ideas burning a hole in my brain: A YA thriller and a fantasy novel. I haven’t written much fantasy but one of the Flash Fiction Ch alleges inspired an idea.
October 8, 2012 — 6:03 PM
Deacying Orbits says:
Last year was the first time I had ever heard of, much less tried NANOWRIMO. But I like the idea and the sense of community it builds around the task of writing.
I “failed” miserably, but it did help me to kickstart my writing — which is why I’ll probably try it again this year. I see NANO as a forcing function to get me to try and meet some sort of external measure of success. Not that I really need it, but the way things have been going for me lately (in all sorts of ways), then a solid NANO boot in the ass is probably not a bad thing.
Plus they have T-shirts. I love T-shirts. Just ask the people at shirt.woot.com.
October 8, 2012 — 6:41 PM
Jason Arnett says:
This’ll be my fifth year and I’ve won each year I’ve tried. Last year, however, was the year I KEPT writing and ended up having over 110,000 words by the middle of December. This was my first sucessful attempt at writing a novel and not just a pregnant short story or novella, which the first three attempts were.
So it’s taught me how to write a good Zero Draft and then have something huge to go back and edit. I’m done with that, now, too. Planning to write another novel in November this year. Hoping it goes just as well.
October 8, 2012 — 6:56 PM
Josh Neff says:
I’ve done NaNoWriMo a few times. The first time I did it was right after I chanced upon Baty’s book while working at Borders. It got me really jazzed to write (I always thought my biggest problem in writing stories was coming up with a plot), and since it was January and I didn’t want to wait until November, I did it on my own in February. I finished the novel I started, and though it had some pretty huge problems, I was overall pretty happy with it, found the writing process to be a lot of fun, and felt incredibly emboldened by actually starting and finishing a novel. The other times I’ve done NaNoWriMo, I didn’t finish what I started, but that didn’t get me down too much. It’s been some years, but I’m planning to do it next month. I feel like I need a swift kick in the ass, I need to dive right in to writing furiously.
Like Jason said, it helped teach me how to write a solid first draft. I’ve gone back to the first novel I wrote, looked it over, and thought about changes I’d make to work it into a much better second draft. I’m hoping I get a similar first draft this November.
October 8, 2012 — 7:35 PM
nikki says:
i commented on an old blogpost, it’s my first Nanothing, i am glad i found a bit of more down to earth commenting on it here in your blog. the website is a bit too bouncy 2.0 for my taste but i am trying to take it on board too, .it’s a good start as i am hoping it will help me get something structured out there by the end of the year. maybe turn it into a novel someday. but mostly, give my writing some sort of purpose and also edit it so that i can at least give it to unofficial proofreaders.
October 8, 2012 — 10:25 PM
Jessica Burde says:
I’m debating. I have a couple of ideas for novels that I’s like to purse but 1) I don’t know if I have time to start a new project on top of the paid writing, non-fiction book, web serial, two blogs and newsletter. 2) The ideas I have both require a fair amount of research before I’d be ready to even start an outline. So if I do NaNoWriMo at all it will probably be continuing an already started project. Which is cheating, but since my writing process doesn’t work well with NaNoWriMo anyway (first draft? you mean that thing where I’ve already rewritten my story 5 times, and the expansions have finally reached novel length? ….) Yeah, NaNoWriMo does not fit my writing process at all, but the goal setting is useful.
October 8, 2012 — 10:50 PM
Snellopy says:
I’m having a crack at it again. Tried twice previously, with pitiful word counts. This year, though, I’ve been doing a shit-ton more writing. Haven’t worked out what just yet, but I will do some planning soon.
November is a shitty time for me, because there’s so much else going on. I do all my work in spare time at work, but there’s always a heap of testing and dealing with parents which eats into that free time.
I doubt that I’ll get anywhere near 50,000 words, but this time I’m not going to give up. I won’t be looking at their graph thing, because I’ll be starting a week late due to lounging around on a beach drinking cocktails in the school holidays. But I do intend on finishing this one.
October 9, 2012 — 12:09 AM
joe says:
I did NaNoWrimo last year and failed miserably to go past one page. My plan was to spend October planning for the novel and then November writing it. I came up with the idea of writing a memoir about my family and extended family which I think is crazy enough to be worth a slot on the soap opera on daytimes.
So for all that excitement about being a writer and churning 50k words at the end, I learned a valuable lesson: Enjoy the mood and do you. November is one of out 12 months if I am to be a serious writer, nothing will stop me from bleeding on the page day in and out.
October 9, 2012 — 12:14 AM
UrsulaV says:
I do what I like to call NaNoFiMo—as in “finish the goddamn thing month.” My methodology usually involves starting a couple things throughout the year, working on them sporadically–twenty or thirty thousand words here and there–and I like the enthusiasm of November to actually sit down and jam through on existing projects. (I long ago stopped feeling guilty for this slapdash ethic, as I do finish things and my agent pitches them and all is right with the universe.) While I generally average about a thousand words a day, during November i push harder, dig out old pieces, and try to hammer out some serious word count on ’em.
October 9, 2012 — 12:14 AM
terribleminds says:
@Ursula —
Yeah, how the hell could you feel guilty by being productive, regardless of the form such productivity takes?
GO TEAM HYENA CLITORIS
— c.
October 9, 2012 — 7:45 AM
Pallav says:
I completed NaNoWriMo once in 2010, but last year’s writing project got so heavily messed up in the middle because of a difficult plot point that it was beyond redemption. This year, i am planning to go in with proper planning. Good luck to all those who are participating!
October 9, 2012 — 2:00 AM
Alena says:
This will be my second NaNoWriMo. My first one went well beyond imagination, but I had lots of free time on my hand. This year will be more difficult, but I’m a bulk writer anyway, so it’s really just a kick in the ass to start a new project.
Which is really what I’ve been using NaNoWriMo for: Kicking off a new project with a blast.
October 9, 2012 — 4:16 AM
Alexy Saltekoff says:
That was an awesome weekend. I wish I still smelled like fried chicken.
I’ll be writing during NaNoWriMo again this year probably because some horrible disaster always happens that keeps me from finishing. I seem to enjoy pain. Last year i was deployed and had a two-week bout of gastroenteritis right at the start of NaNo. Hero’s journey version: the hero wanted to write, but spent the entire time running back and forth to an outhouse in the desert cursing every deity he could think of. I think I only got 750 words written on my phone, but at least I didn’t die with my pants around my ankles.
October 9, 2012 — 9:41 AM
Scott Zachary says:
I am seriously considering doing NaNoWriMo because I have decent typing skillz but still can’t write more than a couple hundred word of *story* an hour–even if I’m forcing myself not to revise and edit as I go. So, I need to blow open the floodgates somehow. In addition, I can’t comprehend writing 50K words of the same story. Hell, I can hardly comprehend writing 5K. So, it will be a kick in the arse exercise.
Also, I have buy-in from the Darling Spousal Unit, so there’s that.
October 9, 2012 — 1:14 PM
Robyn says:
I did NaNoWriMo in 2009 and 2010, and won both times. I took last year off to do a second draft (my own personal NaNoEdMo). I’ll be doing it again this year because I love the cameraderie. My problem with the whole thing is that first drafts are not my problem, it’s more like fourth- or fifth-drafts. As in, I can’t stop editing and get to the point of sending things out.
October 9, 2012 — 2:54 PM
Mark H says:
This is my 8th year of NaNoWriMo. At this point, writing 50,000 words in a month is no longer a challenge. Instead, the event is an opportunity to meet with both new people and old friends. (I met my girlfriend at NaNoWriMo, for people who complain that writing is solitary.) Also, it’s an opportunity to make writing the #1 priority in my life, at least for a while, and soak up the frenzied pace as I put my fingers to keyboard, as there are writers in my area who can manage 100-200k words over the month and competing with them is a blast if usually a losing battle. This year, I’m re-writing and completing a draft I did a couple of years ago.
October 9, 2012 — 3:36 PM
E.M. Wynter says:
I did NaNo last year for the first time and it definitely released me from my bed of sadness. I guess I technically “won” because I completed 50K of my first novel, which I ended up finishing in the spring at around 110K words. Not bad for a first go.
But now, when I look at the mountain of editing that I have to do to THAT manuscript, I’m hesitant to do another NaNo. Deadlines are really helpful, to be sure, but I need to build a solid structure that can then be painted and made pretty – not a gobble-de-gook. I will however, be wishing all the NaNos the very best from the bleachers.
October 9, 2012 — 4:09 PM
Kat Clements says:
I am definitely planning on doing NaNoWriMo this year. I did it in 2010 and got half of my novel done, totally flubbed up 2011, and hope to use this year to either finish my current novel or get some prose churned out for another one. I really like having an externally created goal to reach for, and I just love watching the bar graph increase every day. It’ is a challenge, but totally worth it.
October 9, 2012 — 5:28 PM
UrsulaV says:
I dream of a day when all that Twilight Team Edward/Team Jacob crap is swept away before the raging onslaught of TEAM HYENA CLITORIS!
October 9, 2012 — 11:17 PM
Aimee W. says:
Stumbled on NaNo in 2008, I believe, and won it twice last year–wrote 100k on two mss in thirty days. I can’t beat that, now can I? So I’m out. But I do owe a debt of gratitude because I learned to ditch the lame-o artistic temperament and get the words down so I could spit shine them and hug on them later. NaNo can be a hell of a writer tool.
October 10, 2012 — 9:59 AM