Well, starting tonight at midnight I am going to participate in the National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). I’ve thought about it in the past but have finally screwed up enough courage to make a fool of myself on (virtual) paper. As I understand it, the goal is quantity and not quality and, more specifically, a work of 50,000 words. Writing so much is such a short time forces the writer to steamroll over his/her inner censor.
Friends and acquaintances who’ve done NaNoWriMo have said it can be an intense experience and a real challenge of will to slog through it. The average word count per day is 1,667. Maybe it is crazy for me to take this on in November, the beginning of busiest retail season of the year; nevertheless, I’m going to try.
Originally, I planned to modify the rules and write 2 short stories rather than one novel. I even had two vague story ideas. Twenty-five thousand words is too much for a short story though — more like a novella or even ‘novelette’, and wrapping up one story then immediately launching a new one seems like an onerous thing to do under pressure. In the last week one of those ideas stuck in my head and has engaged me enough to commit to this one story and go for the full novel.
Wish me luck.
