The stars aligned perfectly so year so I could finally give NaNoWriMo a shot this year. For those who don’t know what NaNoWriMo is, it’s basically a goal of writing a 50,000 word novel during the month of November. And though you can see from the above badge, I didn’t make the 50,000 word goal (or my original 80,000 word goal), I actually enjoyed the challenge and consider it a success because it got me writing every day in November and I was able to complete about 40% of a novel that’s been bouncing around in my head for the last couple of years.
And though the month is over I’m still trying to wrap up the first draft of the novel by year’s end. And even though NaNoWriMo’s over, I got Judd and his gang kicking my butt to finish it by then or else there’ll be some sort of hell to pay. Don’t worry, boys, I’m on it!
Now that I’ve given NaNoWriMo a shot, I think it’s a good exercise for anyone who wants to write a book. If anything, it got be back in the habit of writing every day instead of three or so times a week. And now that I’ve got my daily writing time set aside, I think I’ll be able to finish this novel but others are constantly sloshed around in my brain.
The only thing I didn’t like about it was that I felt I had to meet the 50,000 word goal or else I was some sort of failure. The reason I only ended up with just under 36,000 words is that about half way through the month was that the novel, at least way I had outlined, just stopped working. I went back and reread what I penned and realized that I could take some time and rewrite several chapters or I could push another 25,000 words and “win” or I could try to do it right the first time. I opted for the latter knowing that I’d just be wasting my time trying to push out words that had zero chance of being used.
In any event, now that I’m back on the writing bandwagon now it’s time for DeNoWirMo and then 2011NoWriYr. If all goes well, I hope to be able to have another novel ready for a publisher by spring. And that would be a real victory.