NaNoWriMo

Happy November!

November is a wonderful month.  The weather has turned cooler (at least in the northern hemisphere) and the days are shorter.  It's a good time to finally sit down to the computer and work on that novel that you've always said that you wanted to write but never had the time.  The goal of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) is to write 50,000 words in 30 days.  That comes up to approximately 1,667 words per day, which isn't much at all.  In fact, why don't you time yourself?  How long does it take you to actually write 1,667 words.  I bet it's not too long.  Can you devote that much time every day to the task?

When I am working on a novel, I will usually write in 1-hour increments.  That's one solid hour that I'm not allowed to take phone calls, check email, or wander over to social media sites.  It's one hour of writing.  At my best, I can write just over 1,500 words per hour.  So, within 90 minutes I can hit my target for the day.  What about you?  Can you devote 90 minutes of your day to writing a story?

The thing to remember is that you're not going to have a finished novel at the end of the month, ready to ship to a publisher.  You're just creating a rough draft.  This is the time to pour all your ideas onto the page.  See what works.  Figure out what doesn't work.  When you finally type those magic words "THE END", you can look back and decide what will improve the novel.

So, stop by NaNoWriMo and give it a try!  Happy writing!