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Get your fingers revving ladies! November is just around the corner and you know what that means don't you? A whole month full of lots and lots of writing! We're only a few days away from the start of NaBloPoMo and NaNoWriMo! Confession: I have have never participated in either. To be perfectly honest NaNoWriMo scares the pants off me. NaNoWriMo, or National Novel Writing Month, started in 1999. The goal is that between November 1 and November 30 you will write a novel - a 50,000 word novel! That's approximately 1666 word per day! My reaction to this? Scary. Daunting. But exciting. Part of my problem is that I'm convinced I'd hate everything I'd write, or that I'd write myself into a corner...or...or...any other of the ever increasing or's that pop into my head when I think about this. But that's part of point of NaNoWriMo. It's supposed to be a bit scary. And you aren't supposed to love everything you write. At least according to their about page.
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.
Again, scary and exciting. It kind of makes me think of a book I read as a kid (I know, you are shocked). I believe it was called Serendipity Summer (my sincere apologies if I have the title wrong, my search skills are failing me and I haven't seen the book since I was at least 14). It was about the girl and her younger brother and the son of an out of town friend who was staying with them for the summer (who was of course the girls age and cute). Their parents had a plan for them - to discover the city (New York of course), to do some educational activities, and, hopefully, to discover something about themselves. The parents had dubbed it the Serendipity Summer. Of course, the younger brother was the smart one and had to explain what serendipity was to the others. Obviously the description stuck with me. He described it as falling into a pile of poop and discovering a unicorn (gee, I wonder why that stuck with my ten year old self...) - finding the wonderful in unexpected places. Why does NaNoWriMo make me think of that book? Because it's about putting out a bunch of words, expecting a lot of them to be crap, but maybe finding something wonderful. Of course, I'm still not going to do it. I'm pretty consistent in being a chicken. Luckily the world, and the blogosphere, is made up of women braver than I. And I really want to read some of the stories. Take The Musings of Wendy Withers. She's planning to write zombie chick-lit! COOL!!!! And of course there are people who wonder about their sanity simply because they'd decided to join. Eloise by the Book Pilesis one of those people.
This year I have gone similarly mad, but am feeling very excited about it. I have had an idea for a story rattling around my head for the past couple of months, which has been very irritating as it has distracted me from the other things I'm trying to write.
Hmm exorcists and zombies...I'm seeing a theme here. If you are like me and are too chicken to join in NaNoWriMo there is another option for you in November. A bloggy option. That option is NaBloPoMo. NaBloPoMo is a simple concept - you have to post on your blog every day for a month. EVERY SINGLE DAY. Hey my American friends, that means Thanksgiving Day too - no time off for holidays or travelling. Please note that I said it was a simple concept, not that it would be easy (despite the fact that I know many bloggers who do this already). It's definitely doable (again I know this because I know bloggers who do this already). Of course I'm sure I'd be reduced to a few days of pooterish posts in which I make various lists (most likely of the books that are on my to be read
