It’s September 27. That means that means November is just around the corner…and if you’re a writer who lives inside the internet—I pretty much exist only on the internet—there’s a big chance the wo…
Source: NaNoWriMo is just around the corner!
It’s September 27. That means that means November is just around the corner…and if you’re a writer who lives inside the internet—I pretty much exist only on the internet—there’s a big chance the word “NaNoWriMo” has popped up here and there.
What’s NaNoWriMo? Well, the name explains it all: National Novel Writing Month. The idea behind it is to take a project—you can plot it out, or it can be something from before—and get started on November 1st. You write every day until you reach 50,000 words by November 30. In short, you’re tasked with writing 50k words in 30 days.
I’ve been doing this for years, ever since a faculty member at the university I work at told me about it. Back then, it was October 2011. I was in a graduate English literature program, teaching and taking classes. I was also working on the side to make some extra cash to afford the going to class. That said, I decided to participate and write my second attempt at a long project (I hadn’t tried writing a novel since 2009, when I had written four chapters of one, and then proceeded to give up that project due to workshop feedback).
Long story short (and I cut it since I think I can talk a lot about writing projects, especially this one since it taught me a lot), I failed. I hit 45k and stopped. I was burned out and thought I would never write again.
You’d think that the failure would’ve stopped me from every trying to participate in NaNoWriMo every again. But somehow, failing by being so close…it actually pissed me off…
I had to try again.
And again.
And by the third try, in November 2013, I won the first NaNoWriMo by writing a short cyberpunk novel I tried to use as my thesis project for my MFA (spoiler warning, I didn’t use it. I wrote something completely new).
Over the years, NaNoWriMo helped me learn that I could achieve a lot of writing if I just sit down and set a goal. I’ve heard it before. If you want to do something, set a goal and a deadline. Somehow, that makes it more realistic and attainable. That’s what NaNoWriMo is to me.
So, here comes November again. Now, in past years, I’ve used October as a “NaNoWriMo” warm up. For my MFA thesis, I used October to write 35-40k words of the novel in order to get to 90k by the end of November. However, this year I participated in Camp NaNoWriMo (which I’ll bring up with time), and have already reached 30k of a new project.
That said, this means I get to spend plotting and working on what I have in order to have a good foundation for November. If you’re in any way interested, I’ll be posting updates on a fairly regularly basis. Maybe I’ll even post some excerpts 😉
Are you participating in NaNoWriMo? Please let me know!
I’m afraid I won’t be participating in nano this year. I did the past two Camps at 30k each, and I am burnt. I’m still plotting and editing, but putting a 50k story on my to do list will really put me over the edge! For once, I’ll be on the side lines, and I’m definitely looking forward to cheering everyone on!!
I’ve been there! I skipped over NaNoWriMo 2014 because of class and work, so I understand. The sidelines aren’t that bad though! I liked talking to people during that time. I love the energy! You could always do a pseudo nanowrimo and just write a bit every day with the rest of us!