For the first time I actually participated in Nanowrimo. Every other year I’ve been mid-book when Nano started, so this year was the year. I finished up a rough draft of a YA contemporary I’ve been working on and I had an idea for a YA Post Apocalyptic. It was going to be epic.
Here’s the deal: I’m a planner when it comes to writing. I want to see the whole story at once and pick and choose where in the story I’m going to write. But this year, I couldn’t. I only had 2 days to plan and one of those days filled up quickly with kid stuff.
So, I went for it, starting with the few scenes I had planned. But where do I go from there? Once those were done, I was lost, but I still had 2k I had to write that day. I just kept pushing on. And you know what? I finished!
The story is a mess, but I’ve learned a few things along the way.
- You can do anything if you put your mind to it including write 50 THOUSAND words in 30 days, (I did it in 28.)
- Putting aside other things won’t kill you. Yes, my house was a mess for a month, but I got my 2k a day average! 🙂
- Surprise! If you don’t know what is going to happen next in your story, neither will your readers.
- Seriously, I was surprised by a few things in this story. I didn’t expect my characters to do certain things, but they did.
- There’s always time to clean up aka. edit.
- Like I said, the story is a mess. But it’s there. The events are all out of order because I didn’t have time to figure out where they’d go when I got a new idea. I just put it wherever I wanted it. 🙂 I have the next year to clean up the storyline and add elements that will actually make it a story because right now, it’s a giant pile of word vomit.
So, did you participate in Nanowrimo? If so, how did you do?
Recent Comments