National Novel Writing Month

Only two days before November first and the start of this year's NaNoWriMo.  It will be my seventh time participating in this crazy endeavor. 

The first time I did it, in 2002, there were about 14,000 participants.  That number, 14K, was about my word count as well!

In 2003 I managed to get 50K.  I remember I was in the middle of a sentence, not sure which way to take it.  I already had the habit of running a word count whenever I paused to think, and that particular word count came out slightly above 50,000.  My brain shut off!  I couldn't finish the sentence!  Job done!  I think it took me more than two months before I wrote fiction again.  Brain empty.

I took a few years off; came back in 2007 with a new screen name (my current one).  It only took me a month to write again after getting my 50K; 2008 was about the same.

In 2009, the number of participants was around 119,000.  No, my word count did not keep up!  51,667 was my word count that year.  I didn't STOP writing until around the end of April, 2010, though!

In November 2010, I had a grand time writing my first dragon.  Opinionated and stubborn (one afternoon he refused to cooperate and told me to go take a nap!), he remains one of the most fun characters I’ve written.


This year, like always, I have no outline.  I'm a 'pantser' = write by the seat of my pants, letting the characters tell me the story.  I do have my main characters, a couple of auxillary ones, and ideas that I hope will carry me through at least the first three days.  I know that once the writing starts, options for the story line will pop into my head.  They'll go into a file to draw on when the story isn't flowing well.  Somehow it works. 

Practice is good.  NaNoWriMo is a marathon of a writing practice.  Every year my writing has improved from October to December.  I feel that every writer should try it at least once.  You push the boundaries of what you view as possible.  Prior to NaNo I wrote short stories.  I had no idea that I could write 5000 words in one day.  (My personal best is 6K; necessity and all that.)  In November, I usually write 4K each Saturday and Sunday.  I would never have learned that without NaNo.

No matter what the word count on that first morning of December, you’ll have a story that didn’t exist on Halloween and the thrill of writing along with so many others.  I think they are expecting over 200,000 people to participate this year, from all over the world.

Many of the people who read my blog are WriMo veterans.  If you're one of the folks who isn't and have considered writing a novel "some day," perhaps this is the year you try. Come join us!


Thanks for reading; comments always welcome.