Writer's Grove

NaNoWriMo

So there’s this thing called National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo. It’s in November, along with Movember, when dudes grow mustaches for men’s nads or something. The two are probably not related but they could be if you wanted. You could get ontological about it and wonder what came first, the mustache or the novel?

(I cannot speak for others, but in my case, it was the mustache.)

I don’t know why they chose November for this, honestly. With Thanksgiving and the orgy of consumerism immediately afterward, it seems like a torpedo heading your way at the end to sink your progress. BUT. Ours is not to wonder why: Ours is to write. And what is the goal?

50,000 words in one month.

That breaks down to about 1,667 words a day. About five or six typed, double-spaced pages.

There’s an organization for this and you can sign up and all that (get thee to Google if that is your desire). The purpose of that is just to be accountable, I think? I’ve never signed up because I’m contrary that way and for me, every month is novel writing month. But I think bangin’ out 50K words is a great idea. I’d like to do that and be accountable for it, tap into that group energy out there. SO WHADDAYA SAY? Wanna write with me and all the other peeps doing this? You can join the thingie and be official if you want, or you can just be accountable on social media, which is what I’m going to do: Every day in November, I’ll Tweet and Facebook my word count, both daily and cumulative. You can follow me on Twitter @kevinhearne or on FB here.

I may throw in some writing thoughts on my FB page—stuff I’ve picked up that works for me. Your mileage may vary, of course, and PLEASE realize that there is no single right way to write a novel. Every book is unique because we are all unique beings and work differently.

A couple of things to put out there now:

1. The Focus view in Word or Scrivener works great for me. Keeps me from getting distracted by stuff happening on my desktop.

2. Freedom for Mac, an app which turns off your internet access for a specified amount of time (usually one hour) also helps. Very few messages/tweets you’ll receive require an instant response. They can wait less than 60 minutes while you get your words in.

So write your novel. Or novella. Or short story collection. But get those words in and make it a productive month! Let’s do this! See you out there!