Oh my god next month is November. And you know what that means, right?
NANOWRIMO TIME!
For those aren’t in the know, NaNoWriMo is National Novel Writing Month. (That’s where I first posted that Minus 1 Rule character creation post from earlier in the year.) It traditionally happens in November, but there is one in June, too, and other events in other months throughout the year. But November is always the big one.
The premise is simple: you write 50,000 words in 30 days. November 1 12.00am to November 30 11.59pm. Fifty thousand words.
It comes out to 1,667 words per day, which is a little less scary to think about. Depending on font and page format, that’s anywhere from one to three pages. (Three pages if a fully formatted manuscript; usually a page and a half for us normies who don’t type double-spaced and in 12 point courier.)
Traditionally, you start an entirely new novel, and somehow finish that within the month/wordcount goal. I’ve written chapters longer than 50k (do not recommend), so I usually use it as a chunk. I’ve started new projects and continued existing ones. In my opinion, the only thing that really matters about the challenge is 50k fresh young words written in a 30 day window.
There are a lot of different terms related to it (which we’ll cover next week—October is the month of NaNo-related blog posts!), but as with many things, it is really as much as you want to make out of it. On the website, there’s a buddy system, expansive forums, really cool graphs and stats to distract you constantly, and little achievements to earn.
Or you could do none of those!
Last year, and through this year (and probably forever), I’ve been using Dabble Writer, which has an automatic updater to the wordcount on the website. Yes, that’s very convenient, but I sort of liked going over to my other tab and updating it every 73 words. The little victories add up, you know?
You can update your wordcount as often as you want. You can set custom goals. You can do word sprints, get mock covers made, borrow a traveling shovel, meet Mr. Ian Woon, and more. The community has been around for over a decade now, and I personally have been participating off and on since high school.
For anyone who has any interest in writing a novel, whether it’s their first or their thirtieth, I cannot recommend NaNoWriMo enough. It teaches you dedication, commitment, and the screaming urge to hit your wordcount goal for a day.
Plus, the sheer rush at hitting major wordcount goals, in a matter of weeks? That shit’s better than cocaine.
Next week: some NaNoWriMo terms and website features! (AKA an explanation of that above paragraph.) The week after: my personal tips & tricks for kicking NaNo’s ass!
