It’s that time of year. No, I’m not talking about turkey and cranberry sauce, I’m talking about NaNoWriMo. The month when people from all over decide that THIS year they’re going to write that novel and they dedicate the month of November to achieving that goal.
I think National Novel Writing Month is great, a celebration of the decision to be a novelist and the action required to follow through. It makes me remember when I decided that this year I was going to do it; I was going to write a book. I didn’t have NaNo, which is probably a good thing because if I’d tried to do it in a month I might not have done it at all. Instead, I aimed for 3 pages a day for 3 months. I arranged my schedule so that I had a set time for writing, and I used that time to produce those 3 pages, no matter what. I also made it a goal to do something every day to move forward towards my goal of publication; reading an article or a chapter of a book on fiction technique, studying the market, working on a query letter.
If the idea of writing a book in a month, or a week, two weeks, or even 70 days makes you want to crawl back into bed and pull the covers over your head, don’t give up. Just try to break it down into something smaller and more attainable. Maybe it works well to write fast and get it down in a rush over a short period of time. Or maybe the only time you can carve out of your day is enough to write one page. In that case, NaNo is not for you, but this can still be your year; write that page every day and next year you’ll have a finished book.
I finished my first book more than ten years ago. Since then I’ve written books at all speeds. Some come fast, some come slow. Some come easy. Some fight every step of the way, every page, every paragraph. The one thing all my books have in common is that they all get written because fast or slow, easy or hard, I stick with them until I reach the end.
This is a difficult business for anybody accustomed to instant gratification. The only way to get that is by sitting down and producing a scene. Then you can have the gratification of having written. But the gratification of seeing that finished pile of pages that make up a complete manuscript, or the letter requesting the full, or the offer, or the book in print on a shelf in a bookstore, those things don’t come fast. That’s okay. Not everything in life has to come at the pace of a drive-through. Some things are worth the time it takes, months or years. It’s a book, not a Big Mac.
Maybe NaNo works for you, and if it does, hooray. I’ll cheer you on from the sidelines. Maybe it worked for you once, but this time, this book, you just can’t produce as quickly. It’s taking longer.
Write. In the end, it doesn’t matter how quickly or slowly you wrote the book. What matters is that you wrote it. You did it. You can bask in the glow of achievement. And then you can start all over, again and again, as many times as you want to. You did it once. You know you can do it again. You’re a novelist.
[...] I’m at RTB talking about NaNo for non-NaNoers. [...]
by Writers Blog » Blog Archive » I’m not here November 16th, 2007 at 7:41 amSome years it works, some it doesn’t.
I think when the book is flowing pretty well anyway, having a forum to post your daily word count may indeed speed up the process. A little. Last year I nanoed successfully (it’s my May 1 release — stop by my blog and see the new book trailer) but this year it’s been a bust for me.
I DO like the “word wars” — where you go to a forum, they say “go” and you write like a demon for 20 minutes and then post your word count. Even when I’m not in a flowing mood, I can force myself to type like a maniac for 20 minutes. I may get about three usable sentences out of it, but it’s a good jump start sometimes.
by Toni Andrews November 16th, 2007 at 9:04 am“Some fight every step of the way, every page, every paragraph.”
by Bernita November 16th, 2007 at 9:43 amLike mine right now.
Thank you. An excellent essay.
I really admire the writers participating in NaNo.
November is a crazy, busy time of year for me
(especially this year as my baby sister, sigh, is getting married next week).
I can’t imagine writing a novel during it.
Heck, I barely get my holiday shopping done.
But I am definitely cheering from the sidelines!
by Kimber Chin November 16th, 2007 at 9:45 amThis is a wonderful post…inspiring, just when I needed it to be. Thank you!
by Kacie J November 16th, 2007 at 10:34 amWe Nano-ers (I’m a municipal liason for Naperville, Illinois, meaning I’m an “official cheerleader” and participant) encourage you to try Nano next year, even if you think it’s a little overwhelming.
Writing is such a lonely vocation, and Nano is all about community, so it’s just (I think) a lot of fun to have a group of people working together toward a common goal. (Plus there are a lot of people moving at the same pace, so my buddy and I can both moan about how awful the middles of our novels are, at the same time, because we are both in the “middle” of our novels right now.)
I do Nano as an exercise in creativity, and as a participation in something that is greater than the whole of its parts. To me, Nano is about stretching your horizons–my goal is not to write a GOOD novel, just to do something different. I currently am working on completing a sex scene using twenty words given to me by a work friend (our goal: the most cliche’d love scene ever written) and honestly, when else would you do something so silly but during Nano? I know some people take it quite seriously, and to some extent I do too, but whenever I start to feel like it’s work and not fun, I do something goofy I wouldn’t normally do when writing a novel.
Yay to all the Nano participants out there!
Meredith
by Meredith November 16th, 2007 at 10:59 amI’ve NaNo-ed — and completed novels doing it.
I highly recommend the official NaNoWriMo handbook “No Plot? No Problem!” for tips and strategies for getting the words on paper.
A wise editor (I base this assessment on the fact that he was the first to buy one of my stories) once said that if you write one page a day you will have a novel in a year. Using Courier — which he mandated for all submissions — that’s about 250 words a day. One year would produce a 91,250-word novel. (A 120,000-word novel would require fifteen months, but you could knock out an 80,000-word novel in about ten and a half.)
by KeVin K. November 16th, 2007 at 12:49 pmNice insights, Charlene. I remember first hearing a couple of my online writer friends talking about NaNoWriMo back in 2001, and how people on the writing community web sites were joining up. I’ve watched the motivation and fun it’s provided for so many writers every year since (and I’ve participated myself twice.) The great thing to me is that there are no restrictions on genre or content — anyone can be a NaNo’er, and write whatever they want. That’s terrific.
Chris Baty (NaNoWriMo founding father) has a great feature here about the short history of this annual writing fest.
by Lynn November 16th, 2007 at 1:18 pmI watched an interview with Danielle Steele in which she described that it takes her…are you sitting down: 1 year to plot, 1 year to write, 2 years self-editing and in edits with the publisher. 4 years. I think she works on more than one at a time, but not sure.
I was initially stunned. Since I can’t plot, I can at least skip that first year
Like your post, Charli. We all must follow our own clocks.
by Ciar Cullen November 16th, 2007 at 1:36 pmAin’t that the truth!
by Kalen Hughes November 16th, 2007 at 5:39 pmToni, I’ve never tried word wars, but I love to race the timer. It’s a sure way to get things going!
by Charlene Teglia November 16th, 2007 at 5:39 pmBernita, some books are like that. We have to beat them down.
by Charlene Teglia November 16th, 2007 at 5:40 pmKimber, it is a nuts time of year to do something like Nano, but it’s also an excellent way to focus through the holidays!
by Charlene Teglia November 16th, 2007 at 5:40 pmKacie, glad it helped.
by Charlene Teglia November 16th, 2007 at 5:41 pmMeredith, keeping it fun is a good idea, and I know it helps to work towards a goal together. I’ve done book in a week, book in a month and fast draft groups. It’s great to have support, but it doesn’t always work out depending on timing, the project, etc.
by Charlene Teglia November 16th, 2007 at 5:43 pmKevin, good for you! And that’s exactly the point, if you just work in whatever amount works for you - even if it’s only one page a day - that adds up and brings you to you goal.
by Charlene Teglia November 16th, 2007 at 5:44 pmLynn, thanks for the link! I do love seeing all the enthusiasm for novel writing every November. It makes me happy to think of people experiencing that rush of really doing it instead of just dreaming about it; writing a novel.
by Charlene Teglia November 16th, 2007 at 5:45 pmCiar, fascinating about Danielle Steele! She does produce good books, which is just proof that whatever time table works for you is right for you. I think I would be insane after 4 years of working on the same thing, but you can’t argue with her results.
by Charlene Teglia November 16th, 2007 at 5:46 pmI’d like to hear more about Nanos that got into print. Finishing a book is a really great but it’s nice to see the manuscript jump the next fence too
I like to know where people started out because it makes the whole think seem more… possible.
by emily November 16th, 2007 at 9:11 pmI’m doing NaNo for the second time this year. And like last year, I’m up at my Mom’s for Thanksgiving and haven’t actually written any fiction for a couple of days. But anyway. [wry smile]
For me, NaNo is a great motivator and learning tool. I went into it last year not expecting to make the 50K mark, but rather just hoping to have a good chunk of a novel done at the end of the month — sort of a jump-start on a writing project. I shocked myself by actually making the wordcount, and learned some things about myself and what I can do if I buckle down and let some other things slide.
Some people sneer because 50K words isn’t “really” a novel. That’s not really the point, though. Even if you wrap up November only half or two-thirds of the way through your story, it can still be a good start. And for people who’ve always been a bit too intimidated to try writing a novel, NaNo’s chaotic, not-quite-serious atmosphere can be very liberating.
Different people do NaNo for different reasons and go in with different attitudes and expectations. If it sounds like any kind of fun, then it’s probably worth a shot.
Angie
by Angie November 16th, 2007 at 11:04 pmKalen, gratification may not be instant, but it’s sweet.:wink:
by Charlene Teglia November 16th, 2007 at 11:27 pmEmily, I think a lot of NaNoers are first-time novelists and since the vast majority of first novels never sell, it would make sense to me that most of those are learning experiences. Which does not make it less worthwhile. You have to start somewhere, and without bad first novels none of us would write marginally better second novels or good third or fourth novels.
by Charlene Teglia November 16th, 2007 at 11:28 pmAngie, good for you! And 50K is a novel in many markets. Young Adult, or category romance to name two. I aimed for 50K with my first novel because it seemed like a manageable length. I figured I could flail my way through 200 pages. It’s a good size to start on.
by Charlene Teglia November 16th, 2007 at 11:30 pmNaNo helped me finish my first novel a few years ago, because having the one-month deadline helped me push past the places where I would ordinarily have given up. Without it, I might still have tons of beginnings of novels on my hard drive with no middles or endings. Now I do it every year, and try to challenge myself more each year.
My favorite part of NaNo is the atmosphere of the community. It’s great to be around a bunch of people who are just playing around with words, letting out their creativity and not taking it too seriously.
I do think that it’s important to experiment and figure out what works best for you - and sometimes NaNo might not be it. For some people, writing a book that fast is too stressful, and gets in the way of their creativity. I happen to be a fast writer, so NaNo is ideal for me (and the past two years I’ve exceeded the 50,000-word minimum by quite a bit), but there’s nothing wrong with being a slow writer either… what’s important is getting the book written.
by Zoe November 17th, 2007 at 8:00 amZoe, great point. Taking it too seriously is very bad for creativity.
by Charlene Teglia November 17th, 2007 at 8:31 amRomance ebook collection!
by Kumar Mangalam Beerla November 17th, 2007 at 9:53 amhttp://i-ebooks.blogspot.com/2007/10/romance-and-harlequen-ebooks-part-1.html
Last year it worked. This year in the second week of NaNo my publisher sent me edits for a book that I have a contract on. It wasn’t a tough choice to decide which book to work on. I’ve written about 17,000 on my new NaNo novel. I may or may not hit 50,000 by the end of the month.
by Sara Thacker November 17th, 2007 at 10:46 amI love NaNo. This year I have a Dec. 1 deadline so I used the first to weeks of the month and NaNo to get the remainder of my complete done. It worked great and had fun sharing in the writing excitment with all my NaNo buddies! Now I get to cheer them all on to 50K while I revise and polish!
by Melissa McClone November 17th, 2007 at 11:16 amSara, schedule interruptions happen! Good for you, though, making so much headway before edits arrived.
by Charlene Teglia November 17th, 2007 at 12:44 pmMelissa, sounds like you got the benefit of comraderie and met your goals!
by Charlene Teglia November 17th, 2007 at 12:44 pmI’ve done Nano unsuccessfully for several years now…with my schedule, 1K a day is the max I can do unless I have a long, quiet block of time and the words are flowing…then I can hack out 2K…but it’s not consistent. So, I’m not fighting it…I’m writing 1K a day.
by Ericka Scott November 17th, 2007 at 1:37 pmEricka, it’s far better to stick to what works for your schedule than to put undue pressure on yourself…and set yourself up to fail. 1K a day adds up to 4 books a year, which is pretty impressive production.
by Charlene Teglia November 17th, 2007 at 3:08 pmHi Charlene, thanks for the inspiring post! I’m not taking part in Nano I’m doing the Sven’s 70 Days challenge and it’s haaaard.
It’s the first time I’ve ever committed to something like that and it’s a real test of resolve. Your essay came at just the right time.
by Dawn November 17th, 2007 at 11:51 pmI can’t tell you how much I needed to read an entry like this. Thank you Charlene.
by catie November 26th, 2007 at 4:01 am