NaNoWriMo
About five years ago, I was sitting on a bench in front of my college's dining hall. I was sitting there with a friend of mine named Kaly, and she abruptly said that she was really excited for some thing that I couldn't pronounce, much less spell.
That was how I learned about NaNoWriMo – or National Novel Writing Month. It's a month-long sprint to write a novel. Not to come up with an idea for one, or storyboard one. You need to write it. You get the duration of November – regardless of Thanksgiving, or essays, or anything else that could get in your way. I thought she was insane. Up to this point, the longest thing I had ever written was ten pages, half written, back in seventh grade. The idea of writing Fifty-Thousand-Words (for such is NaNo's goal) was completely foreign and alien to me.
That month was absolutely insane. By the end of it, I had new friends, I had a whole lot more information and books on angels and demons than I had previously. I had a sleep deficit of a couple dozen hours. I had seven or eight playlists on iTunes, ordered by character name and section of the plot. Most importantly, I had 50,016 words written about a boy named Cedric and a girl named Britt – who happened to be part-demonic.
I've done NaNoWriMo four times now, with a fifth time coming up in just over a month, which means it's about time to start gearing up for it. I know that it seems early, but this is really when you want to get your creative juices flowing. I normally write something every day, aiming for an hour or so every day. In anticipation of NaNo, I'm going to increase that to an hour of writing, and an hour of thinking about plot ideas before bed. I do that fairly often as is, but I find that I do some of my best thinking when only half-conscious. Furthermore, I'm going to make sure my schedule is as caught-up-on as possible. Given all the prep that's going into NaNoWriMo for me, I figured that it would be a good idea to write a post about how you can prepare yourself for trying to write a novel in a month.
Step 1: Awareness
Seriously. Going into this, you need to know that this is a commitment. 50,000 words in 30 days comes out to 1667 words per day, which, if you're using default margins in Microsoft Word, is about 3 pages. Most people I know can write one, maybe two an hour. Assume that you'll be committing a couple of hours every day to NaNo. Your mileage on these estimates may vary. Tom, for example, can easily write a day's quota in an hour. Then again, he's a writing machine who maintains like a billion projects with the greatest of ease. (Tom, if you're reading this, don't contradict me!) Regardless, you're going to want to be ready going into this. It won't just happen. Writing is easy, but setting time aside for it is hard.
Step 2: Brainstorm
The hardest part of writing a NaNo is coming up with a plot that will last you the full 50,000 words. For clarity's sake, that's probably enough to cover a full length movie. It's easy to come up with the central plot – a guy and a girl meet and fall in love – or whatever, but the hard part is turning that central bit into a bigger story. Making your ideas into more than just a single story that you could tell in a few minutes takes work. Try to write some basic outlines of your characters – write a single scene involving them, just to get a feeling for them. Possibly most importantly...
Step 3: Music
This step helps everyone I know. No one I've ever met writes without some kind of music, and this is no different. Once you start coming up with an idea for a plot, note what you were listening to when you got the idea. Everytime a song inspires something, add it to the NaNo playlist on your iTunes or whatever. Listen to it when you want to write, and I guarantee that the ideas will flow forth like rivers. I couldn't imagine writing anything of significance without having a playlist for it.
Step 4: Support
Find a support network. In my four years, I succeeded two of them, and failed the other two. I completely credit the peer pressure inherent in this event. The number of times I got to dinner and heard that Tom had already rounded the 10k mark, or the 35k milestone are countless. Hearing that someone else is doing better than you is maddening, and will make you go and try to rectify that immediately. Other people, especially if they're determined enough, will get you to your goal.
That said, sign up on the NaNoWriMo website. There's community there, be it the forums, or the actual region that you're a member of. Especially if you're in a city, going to scheduled kickoff parties and weekly write-ins is a great way to keep your count high, and keep connected to the community. I strongly recommend them.
I'm probably going to write a bunch more on this blog about NaNo, especially as November approaches and I start to actually start figuring out what I'm going to write. I've got a whole mess of possible plot ideas, and I need to start sussing out which one is going to be this year's NaNo prospects. Expect that post within the week.
Do you guys have any NaNo preparation rituals? Trying it for the first time and thought these hints helped? Let me know in the comment box below.
You know my NaNo history, and the pretty much epic fail both times I've tried, but this year I think I have a NaNo future. I come far more prepared this year.
ReplyDeleteUsually I come up with setting first, then names, then plot. I have a setting - well, I have a time period and kind of a place. And I have names of 2 of my minor characters, but not my main characters. And unlike last year, it will be only one plot. Unless, of course, my novel changes itself on me again. But I don't anticipate that happening this time. But my plot is vague, too vague. But I have a month to work on these things, so I'm not too worried. I'm further ahead than I've ever been before.
The English Honors Society on campus (yep, I'm blanking on what it's called, fill that in if you want) will be hosting write-ins on campus, which is beautiful because I pretty much can't get to the off-campus ones very easily. They're supposed to be every week, which will also be great, because I need write-ins. I am so very easily distracted without people yelling at me and telling me to focus.
I never thought of making a playlist to match what I wanted my novel to be. I always just made a playlist that helped me to write. It might be interesting to try your way this year. See if it helps.