Let's Do NaNoWriMo Together!

rampage · November 20, 2021, 12:51pm

It’s day 20 (of 30) of NaNoWriMo!

Daily ending word goal: 33,333

Weekly goal: 35,000
*

Yesterday’s target: 31,667

My current word count: 38,715
*

This meme is very much in the theme of that oldie-goldie advice “be the change you want to see in the world.” Many people attribute this quote to Mahatma Gandhi – but that appears to be a spurious claim.

Regardless, it’s good advice. In order to effect change, you have to brave, and many times you have to go alone for a bit while others watch you and realize you’re on to something. This is, frankly, a key element of being an effective leader. With time and persistence, you may find that others will follow (but you will probably have to go first for a while before they’ll join you).

Trying to directly change other people is an exhausting, inefficient endeavor – it’s much easier to change yourself (although it does take self-discipline to change) and find that others change around you once you’ve led by example.

Anywaaaaay, what does this have to do with writing? Well, it’s simple: If you wish a certain style of writing/books existed in the world, you should write that.

Frankly, most of my writing projects are inspired by the things I love – but with elements from disparate genres. Instead of directly imitating a style that I enjoy, I tend to take pieces and parts that I like and thread them together in wacky combos – like a buffalo weaver builds a nest.

For example, when I’m reading a book, I tend to love deeply flawed characters, moral ambiguity, mystery/crime, psychology, the pseudo-supernatural/romantic bits of quantum physics, wacky intentional chosen families, ensemble casts, slapstick humor, and unconventional love stories. I haven’t seen this happen much all in one place (my favorite authors usually have 3-4 of these elements in their books), so I set out to do that.

It’s not the worst place to start… if you’re a new writer looking for a genre/project – what would you like to read that doesn’t exist?

Write it.

Okie dokely – careful readers might note that I’m writing this update earlier than my normal habit. That’s because I got up super early this morning. I woke up and couldn’t get back to sleep, so I decided to get some writing done and update this thread. Full disclosure: I just finished writing today’s words. Probably for the best since I’ll be busy volunteering today (Saturday is a big day for me re: DMS usually).

This means the word count probably won’t move for tomorrow’s post. But who knows… Maybe I’ll do a second session later today. I have no idea. Depends on how tired/inspired I feel.

Anyway, the early morning session was fantastic. Yesterday and today were both excellent. It was all spent writing about supernatural medicine/medical procedures – a medical exam for one non-human character in one scene and considerable time spent progressing on the extraplanar childbirth chapter, which is starting to come together quite nicely.

Okay, that’s it for now. Write the book you want to see in the world, and I’ll do the same.

rampage · November 21, 2021, 2:30pm

Today is day 21 (of 30) of NaNoWriMo! The final day in week 3.

Daily ending word goal: 35,000

Weekly goal: 35,000
*

Yesterday’s target: 33,333

My current word count: 38,715

Sometimes writing a book reminds me of playing a game by yourself. And not a game that was designed to be fun when played by yourself… not a 1-player video game or anything like that. Instead, it’s like playing every single piece in a board game designed for 2+ players. Controlling every car in the game of Life. Playing both sides in Monopoly.

In theory, playing both sides seems like it would be more fun than having something to push against – but it isn’t. Some people find it no fun at all. I find it to be okay, not the best but okay – just different to be honest. And exhausting. There were many times when I was a kid when I wanted to play a game but none of my family members did, so I competed against myself in Monopoly. Typically, I’d end up driving one side (also me) deeply into debt, and instead of bankrupting them (slash myself), I’d run a tab and get wide eyed as said tab grew higher and higher.

I’ve had people who read my books tell me they’re funny and great reads and conclude I must have a great time writing them. The truth is that sometimes it’s fun to write – but I have many days where the writing process is more tedious and painstaking. Days when I feel like I’m playing the car and the thimble on the Monopoly board and the thimble is being driven hopelessly into debt.

That said, yesterday morning’s session was fine. I was really exhausted after giving tours and doing a bunch of chores so I ended up reading instead of sneaking in a second writing session in the evening hours.

I have NO idea what I’m going to write today. I just looked at my "remaining scene " list and sneered. Not a promising start, I know. I’ll figure it out.

rampage · November 22, 2021, 2:43pm

Today is day 22 (of 30) of NaNoWriMo!

Daily ending word goal: 36,667

Ending word goal: 50,000
*

Yesterday’s target: 35,000

My current word count: 40,689

I have posted so many memes in this thread that I had to go back and make sure I hadn’t posted this one already.

Anyhow, I converted the weekly target field to reflect the challenge end instead because week 5 would be a short partial/half-week.

Yesterday’s session was fantastic. Best one I’ve had since the beginning of this challenge. It’s probably because I was so tired… yes, really. Being tired can help you with creativity. It lowers your inhibitions, the inner critic, the “don’t do that” instinct. Made myself laugh and cry yesterday.

Happily, I can report that the section I planned to write on day 1 of this challenge is finally done… and that I love it. Managed to live up to my own standards (and the best part is that now that I have the rough go out, I can continue to refine it in the edits).

The manuscript is also well over 80K now (which is the length of the first four books in this series). Looking at what I have left to write, I estimate another 20K to 40K left to go (with this NaNo challenge requiring about another 10K, meaning I’ll have a chunk of words left to do once I complete it, but not a ridiculous amount). That makes me feel good… on a “normal” book project, I would be done. This volume in the series is just really complex.

Anyway, I know there hasn’t been much drama in my NaNoWriMo journey – I’ve been churning out words pretty consistently. It wouldn’t work for a novel plot, that’s for sure. You need more tension. But that’s what you want if you do get to the point where you’re writing for a living… you want the actual production trajectory to be pretty boring (churn, churn, churn), even though certain sessions – like yesterday – can turn out to feel rather exciting for you.

Okay, time to churn some more. It’s Monday so I have my live serial project to write for in addition to the NaNo words. Mothra save me.

jast · November 22, 2021, 2:57pm

Sorry to disrupt the NaNoWriMo mojo, but I just have to say…
In all honesty, I don’t read your daily musings all the way through every time. I do revisit, sometimes gleaning more than others, and sometimes just moving on with my day. But the one thing that struck me (really, really hard, I might add) was the

bit.
Not that you put it there. That makes perfect sense, but more about how metaphorical it feels for life as a whole. I recall thinking on Day 12ish “will this never end? My stars! We have FOREVER to suffer through this Novel Writing thingy. I have NO IDEA how those actually striving for the words every day DO IT! What a BEATING! Maybe I could still jump on board, if I were going to do that to myself…”.
Then day 14 I mused “hey, we’re almost half-way through this thing…”
Day 15 I noted the halfway point (as did Page):

Day 16 I recall thinking “downhill run”…
Now here we are, just ONE WEEK (discounting anyone writing on Thanksgiving Day we are 7 “writing days” out) from the end.
WHERE DID ALL THE SCADS OF TIME GO!?!?
Kudos to you who have managed even one word of your 50,000 goal for NaNoWriMo. May you be feeling less “mid-NaNoWriMo-life-crisis-y oh-shyte-where-did-the-time-go-y” than I am! Keep striving!

rampage · November 23, 2021, 2:16pm

Not a disruption at all @jast! Glad to have your input. And it IS true how time in something like this can seem to be not moving at all and then abruptly run away from you… reminds me of progress bars when you’re downloading/installing a program … how they get frozen at certain junctures and then zip up precipitously, before getting stuck again.

Today is day 23 (of 30) of NaNoWriMo!

Daily ending word goal: 38,333

Ending word goal: 50,000
*

Yesterday’s target: 36,667

My current word count: 42,499

It’s maybe not the most exciting advice – but I’ve found it to be the case: If you want to get good at something, practice it.

Researching it and finding other people who are good at it and talking with them about it and learning from them is all wonderful – but there’s no substitute for actually getting in there and trying.

And if you can be consistent and intentional in that practice – practice regularly, be appropriately reflective about your own work and/or seek out expert third party opinions to get feedback and grow, and then adjust your approach based on what worked and what didn’t… well, that leads to excellence.

As far as my own NaNo progress, the word count is ticking up appropriately. I will say that the tenor of the last few days has appreciably changed. Once I manage to get the sessions started, the writing has been fun and rewarding. The characters are driving more and half-writing things for me. I suspect it’s because I’m getting within far-spitting distance of finishing it. I always write the endings of books much more quickly and easily than I do the middles (where I was in this draft when I started this challenge).

Hope all is well with everyone playing along at home.

rampage · November 24, 2021, 3:30pm

Today is day 24 (of 30) of NaNoWriMo! And it is also Thanksgiving Eve!

Daily ending word goal: 40,000

Ending word goal: 50,000
*

Yesterday’s target: 38,333

My current word count: 44,393

I feel like we’re now officially gliding into the weird part of the month. While the Thanksgiving holiday isn’t until tomorrow, there’s meal prep to be done today, and a lot of folks are on vacation from work today, traveling to dinners elsewhere, etc. Frankly, these 3-4 days are likely gonna be an odd time to work. How odd will probably depend on your holidays plans and obligations. It makes me glad I have a few days’ lead built up just in case, although my intention going in is to try to write as much as I can.

We’ll see how well I do with that!

I know that Yung Pueblo quote I just posted doesn’t address writing specifically or anything – but it’s how I view the Makerspace in broad terms. What I personally find great about it. Yes, the toolsharing is nice and all – but I love the knowledge-sharing aspect, the social aspect, the collaborative aspect.

Prior to finding the maker movement through friends, I was heavily involved in the arts. When I was young, I worked as a professional musician, was a successful playwright, was a magazine editor, and later have had a good run as a memoirist and mystery author. This sounds pretty charmed, I suppose – and at times it was – but at other times it was quite stressful.

The “starving artist” moniker is no joke. But of course it’s more than that… I also found that artists could be quite vicious and competitive with others in their community. That there was so much backstabbing that it could be quite lonely and alienating… when, really, we probably should have banded together more and helped one another, making us all effectively stronger. (I did that when I could via managing bands and running a magazine.)

Anyway… I firmly believe that a secretive attitude about what you make is a sign of insecurity – and that the way you grow yourself and others is to be open about what you do.

Alright, so how did I do yesterday? Really well! I had my words done quite early in the morning and managed to flesh out a very strange scene that I’d been dreading writing – and it’s almost done now. That is a great feeling.

rampage · November 25, 2021, 3:52pm

Happy Thanksgiving, Writers and Makers!

Today is day 25 (of 30) of NaNoWriMo!

Daily ending word goal: 41,667

Ending word goal: 50,000
*

Yesterday’s target: 40,000

My current word count: 46,125

It’s true! And sometimes you’re wrong.

On the writing front, things continue to go well. I was originally stumped as to how to actually flesh out the scenes I’m working on at the moment when I first threw them in my outline, but I’ve been coming up with good approaches the past few days. Thank goodness.

Since it’s Thanksgiving, I also want to say I’m thankful for DMS. It’s such a rare and valuable community, and I’m grateful to have found it.

rampage · November 26, 2021, 3:57pm

Today is day 26 (of 30) of NaNoWriMo!

Daily ending word goal: 43,333

Ending word goal: 50,000

Yesterday’s target: 41,667

My current word count: 47,976

Yup. The writer experience and the reader experience are so different from one another.

A few days ago, my editor officially greenlit the third book in this series (I’m working on the fifth for this challenge). I’d been worried it was unpublishable, since I took a lot of risks in it. I fully expected for it to be rejected by my editor and for it to never come out. Not so. He said it was great. And as we dove down into the details, he pointed out aspects of it that he liked. Pretty much without fail, his favorite parts were the ones I’d felt the most self-conscious when I wrote them, like I didn’t feel like I knew what I was doing.

Evidently, a reader would never know. And those are the good parts.

Anyway, that was great news. And it’s put a bit of a spring in my step (slash type), since it’s a welcome reminder that the fact that the writing doesn’t feel good on any given day isn’t indicative of its actual quality. I find I must remind myself of that over and over again. Perhaps one day it’ll stick!

Wonder of wonders, I actually wrote on Thanksgiving morning! Huzzah. It looks like I have just over 2,000 words left in this challenge. Perhaps I’ll get there today – it’s not that much more than the daily 1667 that I try to write for this challenge.

P.S. Even though it’s not Thanksgiving anymore, I remain thankful for DMS and my fellow makers.

rampage · November 27, 2021, 3:33pm

Today is day 27 (of 30) of NaNoWriMo!

Daily ending word goal: 45,000

Ending word goal: 50,000

Yesterday’s target: 43,333

My current word count: 50,096

Once upon a time, I thought that if you hadn’t “made it” as an artist by 25, then it was never going to happen for you. What a load of hooey. If you’re reading this, it’s not too late to get started.

It’s possible to sleep late, get started late, and still have a great life – artistic and otherwise.

In other news, I made it! Yesterday’s writing sessions brought me over 50,000 words for November. Huzzah! My book isn’t quite finished (50K is kind of a short book for commercial purposes), but I managed to get past the slowdown I was mired in – and I’m almost done.

My plan is to keep writing and posting updates here for the rest of the month regardless since I still have work to do.

rampage · November 28, 2021, 3:00pm

Today is day 28 (of 30) of NaNoWriMo!

Daily ending word goal: 46,667

Ending word goal: 50,000

Yesterday’s target: 45,000

My current word count: 52,160 (have technically “won” the challenge but am still working)

I find that sometimes my attention/creative brain wants to do something different than I do. When this happens, I either say “okay” and go with it (usually means writing something different than what I set out to write) or I cajole it with offerings/sacrifices/pampering and hope it’ll do what I want. For example, I’ll often be very intentional about the kind of music I listen to while I’m trying to write – and very careful about what I’m reading (since it seeds my unconscious brain/attention). And the music and the reading have a way of bringing my brain closer to where I want it to be.

Even though I am over 50K words now, I’m still writing because my book isn’t quite done (at the pace I’m going, I’ll probably finish the first draft sometime in early December). I had wondered if having "won’ the challenge would backfire and demotivate me… and if I would find it impossible to wrote for a few days. Nope.

I actually wrote the arrest scene yesterday (for the murder subplot), and it was so good. Unexpectedly funny… a lot of weird things are happening in the book by that point in the manuscript, and several founts of quirkiness happen to converge and create a rather silly predicament. Wrote my way through like a champ.

jast · November 28, 2021, 3:31pm

Yeah, but trains of thought going to the destination we want, totally blast through silly little shit like boxes, where your roomba of thought is stuck, bouncing off the walls and wandering in “completely random direction”(s), but getting nowhere.
Motivation fail, k.
(By the way, roombas don’t really go about their jobs in “completely random directions”. They use a framework of decision making processes called an ‘algorithm’ to ensure they eventually get all the floor scrubbed; this only appears random to the “casual” observer – double fail, k.).

Congrats on your win!
And for working to drag others along. We can be a recalcitrant bunch, but we always appreciate the assist!

rampage · November 28, 2021, 4:28pm

Yeah, our roomba is actually fairly smart? But I’m not sure how much of that came factory loaded and how much was because @skyspook created frameworks for it…

Bill · November 29, 2021, 10:09am

Congratulations on making it this far.

Roomba. I like that and will steal it to describe my software development efforts…

A friend is a mystery writer; her pen name escapes me at the moment so I cannot give her a plug. I often greet her with, “Killed anyone interesting lately?” after she once introduced herself by saying, “I kill people for a living.”

In the waning days of October, I had an idea for a novel. It goes something like this:

A newly discovered comet will be making an appearance later this year. It is forecasted to pass close to Venus and maybe even brush it with its tail.

The interloper collides with an undetected asteroid and changes its trajectory ever so slightly. The chance of it hitting Venus becomes more than astronomical. Observers watch with interest as it approaches. Both are visible only as thin crescents.

Astronomers await for it to reappear on the other side of the planet after the conjunction. Nothing. And there are no detectable signs of a collision.

After several weeks of looking for the eclipsing of stars, astronomers determine that the comet is headed toward us. It had apparently skipped off of the thick Venusian atmosphere.

Comet trackers rush to calculate the new course and concludes there is a greater than 50/50 chance it will hit our Moon. Not only that, the event will happen during a total eclipse on May 16, 2022.

The whole world watches in anticipation as it approaches. Though a few doomsayers warn of apocalypse, most look forward to a spectacular show. Experts insist there is no chance that the Moon will be broken up or knocked out of its orbit.

It does not disappoint. Observers are greeted with a bright flash easily seen by the naked eye as the bodies collide. Satisfied, they go to bed.

Comet trackers check their data with horror. The comet, or a large fragment of it, is headed directly toward us. Just after sunrise, it belly flips into the Gulf of Mexico…

After discussing some ideas with a previous NaNoWriMo participant, I realized that it is not in me to write that much in a mere 30 days. Besides, I have been on a full head of steam making progress on a programming project and do not want to risk disrupting that.

Even though the DART mission would have made my story even more relevant, I still do not regret not starting, but I have to admit to following this thread with interest.

rampage · November 29, 2021, 2:29pm

@Bill Very Arthur C. Clarke! I dig it.

And I get it… having finally DONE NaNoWriMo (as opposed to the past when I had merely spoken to others who had done it), I can definitively say that it’s a very particular experience but certainly not the only way to finish a book or progress as a writer. The project that I selected for it is in fact my 9th book, so I managed to write 8 books without ever doing this (5 are published, 2 are in the process of being published, and the 8th I’m holding onto for a while since I have mixed feelings about it).

I wrote my first book several years ago by making a deal with myself that I’d write 500 words a day on it (not 1667) until it was done (no time limit). If I recall correctly, it ended up taking me about 3 months for a 90,000-word book. This is slower than NaNoWriMo speed (1667), about 1000 words a day, but it was twice what I told myself I’d write (I found myself going over on many days), and 500 words was so doable even on the days when I didn’t feel like it.

At the time, I was working as a researcher so I was doing a lot of other, highly technical reading and writing, but I found I could manage the 500 even on days when I had major brain drain.

I will say that editing my first book was very tough. I learned a lot about structure directly from writing that first one. And a lot of first-time authors report similar… a punishing edit teaches you how to better structure your next one so the edit isn’t so harrowing.

Anyway, this is all to say that I think that while NaNoWriMo can be an interesting tool as a challenge that it’s not magical or a make-or-break kind of thing.

Perhaps when the programming project gets to a better place, you could shoot for 500 words a day? (Which again is an arbitrary thing I set for myself – the most important thing is a commitment to keep revisiting the work.)

And yes, mystery does tend to leave a trail of dead bodies in its wake. I find the experience of killing a character off very different if I’ve always known they were marked for death versus one that I’ve killed because I realize suddenly it makes sense for the plot (and I had no intention of doing so setting out).

Okay, on to the stats!
*

Today is day 29 (of 30) of NaNoWriMo, A.K.A. the penultimate (or second to last) day!

Daily ending word goal: 48,333

Ending word goal: 50,000

Yesterday’s target: 46,667

(I have technically “won” the challenge but am still working.)

Image is by the incomparable Sarah’s Scribbles.

I am very close to finishing this book now. Talked to some of my friends about it, told them I’m not looking forward to some of the work I’m going to have to do in order to clean up this draft… I have a feeling that I might have to swap the order of a few of the scenes (I’m cutting back and forth between 4 vantage points near the end). There’s a lot less actual new word generation that needs to be done at this point and more going over the draft to make sure the structure works and flows and that there aren’t huge holes/missing transitions (and if they are, writing what I need to in order to fix things). Really dreading that work. And until it’s done, I can’t say that the draft is.

Told some of my friends, and their response was basically, “Oh you’ll be fine. You’ll be grumpy for a day or two, a week maximum, and then the book will be done.”

And I can’t decide whether to feel seen or dismissed. Because they’re probably right. However, being grumpy for a solid week feels profoundly different when you’re the one pissed off at past self for questionable work habits – versus the person laughing at the grumpy friend. So there’s that.

Alright! Anyone who is still doing the challenge, we have today and tomorrow. May the Force(ing the Words) Be With You.

jast · November 29, 2021, 3:13pm

and antepenultimate gets snubbed again…

rampage · November 29, 2021, 3:17pm

Antepenultimate is always the friend that the bride didn’t select for the wedding party. Never a bride. Never even a bridesmaid.

Bill · November 30, 2021, 9:40am

Thanks. That is a huge compliment.

When this is done, maybe your next calling is showing us the ins and outs of getting published?

rampage · November 30, 2021, 2:12pm

That’s one of my Writerspace class ideas. I’ve been considering teaching it.

rampage · November 30, 2021, 2:24pm

Alright everyone!

Day 30 of 30 of NaNoWriMo, otherwise known as THE LAST DAY OF THE CHALLENGE.

The only target left is 50,000.

That there is your final inspo meme. They really should call them demonwriters, not ghostwriters.

Thank you to everyone who played along, a lot or a little, at home.

Having blitzed my 50K on this book, I’ve spent the last few days making sure everything has proper transitions and that there are no plot holes. Many thousands of words of highly technical writing. I will likely continue that today (most of the remaining writing is simply finishing a handful of scenes that are half-written). I suspect this book will be written sometime in the next few weeks, which is a good feeling.

Final thoughts on NaNoWriMo: It was an interesting challenge, and it did help me get past my neurosis surrounding the middle of the book because I got so desperate for words, I just went for it.

I did find it useful, as someone who has written multiple books and has written at that speed naturally before in the past (though usually not on command), simply for getting unstuck on a project I was overthinking.

I find myself wondering, however, if the challenge couldn’t backfire and discourage a newer writer. That is way too fast for most new writers to work. I have a feeling it’d be easy to fall behind and then get discouraged and not finish the challenge.

If you look at something like Couch to 5K, there’s a tapered process, one that’s semi structured and occurs in a stepwise fashion. I think something like that would probably be more successful in training a newer writer to commit to regular fiction writing.

However, I’m glad I did it. It squares pretty well with my friends’ reports of the challenge, but it was good to experience it myself.

Would I do it again? Maybe? Less as a personal tool and more because a writer friend wanted me to do it alongside of them, I think.