Sticky Notes Blog

A blog of writing news, tips, and inspiration from Fat Plum

50 thousand words in 30 days

Today is the first day of National Novel Writing Month, aka NaNoWriMo. It happens ever year, and it's a terrific event. From the website:

National Novel Writing Month is a fun, seat-of-your-pants approach to novel writing. Participants begin writing November 1. The goal is to write a 175-page (50,000-word) novel by midnight, November 30.

Valuing enthusiasm and perseverance over talent and craft, NaNoWriMo is a novel-writing program for everyone who has thought fleetingly about writing a novel but has been scared away by the time and effort involved.

Because of the limited writing window, the ONLY thing that matters in NaNoWriMo is output. It's all about quantity, not quality. The kamikaze approach forces you to lower your expectations, take risks, and write on the fly.

Make no mistake: You will be writing a lot of crap. And that's a good thing. By forcing yourself to write so intensely, you are giving yourself permission to make mistakes. To forgo the endless tweaking and editing and just create. To build without tearing down.

Can it be done? Yes. I've "won" (that is, finished) NaNoWriMo twice, and both times I was very proud of the result. My mother completed it twice too, creating a full draft of a novel each time, while still working and preparing all the family's Thanksgiving activities.

So get out your pens, typewriters, laptops, Alphasmarts... whatever you need, and get going!

Posted by Cindy on November 01, 2004
This entry was posted in the following categories: Recommended