I survived NaNoWriMo. I wrote 50,000 words in 30 days.
Instead of writing a novel, which I knew I could do, having done it four times already, I just concentrated on writing -- which was exactly what I needed.
Life has a way of creeping into my writing time, sucking up ten minutes here, half an hour there. Next thing I know, I'm staring at a blinking cursor for five minutes, not remembering where I was going with my WIP and knowing I have another obligation to get to, so I might as well go clear that off my schedule instead. NaNoWriMo helps me reset my writing clock every year. I relearn how to find that time I need again.
This year's effort yielded two short stories that I will feature in more length in upcoming posts as I am quite happy with them. I also brought two short story disasters into being. Ms. Wildstar and the gang are fighting them now. More on that in an upcoming post as well.
My biggest progress was getting 25,000 words into a major rewrite of Sahmara's Sunset. That was my first NaNo Novel that I wrote in 2006. I'd never written fantasy at the time, or romance. This one ended up being both.
Sahmara's Sunset surprised me many times (Did I just write that scene? That's pretty good!) and proved to myself that I could write something beyond the one novel I'd been plunking at away at for years. Better yet, It showed me that I could write a draft in thirty days (rather than a decade) AND I could finish it. Let's not mention the huge chunk of missing middle scenes. It had an ending, that was a big step for me.
I tried to get back to working on it pre-NaNo as you may recall, but that lack of time factor impeded any significant progress. Now I'm on a roll. Leaving off just over a quarter into the draft was a perfect place to end NaNo. Instead of being in the middle of figuring out where to go next or stuck in a rough draft wasteland of word count filling crap, I have 25k of pretty, revised, tightened and cleaned up novel (created from 2006's wasteland of crap) that I'm excited about continuing.
How was your NaNo experience?
Congratulations! It sounds as if you had a productive NaNo!
ReplyDeleteWelcome back, Jean! And I hope your (surviving few?) young writers had a productive month too.
ReplyDeleteFound you through the GH thread on Nano. I'm from Muskegon and until tonight, I had no idea there was a group meeting in GH.
ReplyDeleteSo here's a fun fact: I've been trying to network with other local writers for years, and you're the first one I've come across who's actually done some querying. Good luck with that, and congratulations on your 'win'.
Nano was productive. Now I just have to get my behind in gear with cleaning up those shorts so they can go up for critique. :)
ReplyDeleteAlso, I love the title of your blog.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Ray. :)
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you found the Muskegon group. I'm always surprised by the number of wrimos who don't realize there's a group right in their area despite the abundance of NaNo, ML emails pushing people to visit the regional forums.
The GH write-ins brought in 3-6 people. It's the Holland ones that draw 15-20. We'll likely do another big, all day write-in at GVSU again next year. Your group is definitely invited!