Geek-Lit: The Road to NaNoWriMo

If you thought the scariest month of the year was almost over, think again.  For writers, there’s an even more terrifying (and exciting!) month on the horizon: November— National Novel Writing Month.

What is National Novel Writing Month?  According to the official website, Nanowrimo is “thirty days and nights of literary abandon!”  The goal for participating authors is to write 50,000 words of a story from November 1st to 30th.  That’s 1,600+ words a day, all previously unwritten in the context of your novel.  That’s…crazy.

You’re probably asking yourself why anyone would willingly subject themselves to such a ridiculous deadline.  After all, Nanowrimo isn’t really a contest.  The website has forums to discuss ideas and get encouragement from other participants (“wrimos”), and a tracker to let you update your word count— but aside from being able to verify your 50k words and get your name listed on the Winner’s page, there’s no tangible reward at the end of the month.  No cash prizes or publication deals.

So what’s the point? Well, for me at least, having a solid deadline and an unreasonable expectation is just the thing I need to get serious about writing.  And that fact that Nanowrimo is a fairly well-known event means that I can use it as an excuse to blow off all other pressing work/social obligations and just write.  I know that even if I don’t get anywhere near that 50k mark, I’ll still end up writing way more than I would have if I hadn’t been writing my brains out in a mad dash to the 30th (last year was my first wrimo, and I only got a fifth of the way to the goal).

Here’s my top three tips for getting close to that magical 50k word count:

1. Write every day: it doesn’t matter if it’s 50 words or 3,000, they all count.
2. Write down everything: Nanowrimo is about quantity, not quality.  There will be time to edit later.
3. Don’t edit. I’ll repeat that— do not edit.  Don’t take the time to make corrections that take longer than running spell check.  This is writing month, not editing month.  If you take the time to edit, chances are you’ll get bogged down in the details, and you won’t make nearly as much progress as you would have just plowing ahead.  A lot of people use December or January as Nanoedmo (National Novel Editing Month), so save the critical thinking for then.

Interested in participating? It’s not too late to sign up on the official site, but you can also play along at home.  There’s no reason not to use Nanowrimo as the basis for your own personal writing challenge.  I’ve seen plenty of variations on the theme — from writing a comic book in a month, to writing an entire picture book every day of November.

For more information about Nanowrimo, check out the FAQ.

About Lee

Lee is a sometime artist/writer now living in the, ehm, "tranquil" suburbs of Baltimore, MD (formerly of Savannah, GA, and Philadelphia, PA). You can find Lee on Twitter as @late_totheparty and follow the breadcrumbs to her other internet haunts, or check out her illustration portfolio at http://www.lelyillustrator.com.

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