It's about writing, so I guess it belongs here

So October starts in a few days and that means that November is right around the corner, which of course means to me, NANOWRIMO!

For anyone who doesn't know, November is National Novel Writing Month. Every year, tons of people from all over the world struggle together for one month to try to write a novel...in 30 days.

The qualifications are simple, you have to write 50,000 words in the thirty days of November and it can't be something you've written before. I encourage all you novelist out there to participate, because if you're anything like me, then this is the only way you'll get anything done. :glances at patheitic novel thread and turns away in shame:

Well, I haven't seen any NaNoWriMo threads around so I figured we needed somewhere to post about our writing woes and how we'll never finish in time. :)

Feel free to discuss the challenge, what you think you're going to write about this year. Maybe offer some tips to the rest of us who struggle, or who have never done it before.

Also, pop over to www.nanowrimo.org to register for an account that will count your words for you and will give you a place to put an excerpt and a fancy winner symbol when you make it in the end.

Edit:Hey guys, if you'd like, please leave your NaNoWriMo screenname so that we can all become writing buddies and keep an eye on how everyone is doing. My name there is still Sho-Shonojo.

Edit No.2: Here's a little tidbit for those people who had some difficulties writing in the month of November, here are two sites that were given out on the NaNo sites, for NaNo-like challenges during the month's of July and August.
http://julnowrimo.thewrigro.com/
http://augnowrimo.proboards85.com/index.cgi

And for all of you people who finished, or wrote anything at all, run over to this page http://www.nanowrimo.org/nowwhat for tips on what to do now. This page includes publishing tips, words from authors who've had their NaNo's published and a great big list of other challenges to take part in throughout the year.

I have never done it before, but I have always watched others on my LJ do it. I think that I might this year.

I have had a lot of ideas running around in my head that I have wanted to get out so I think that I am going to finally give it a shot. I am just very nervous about it.

Is it really hard to get into the groove of it? One person told me that to hit the mark you at least have to write 1800 words a day in the month.

You should definately try! It's always hard the first time, because you're not sure how to go about it, but it gets easier. This will be my third year trying, I made it last year but failed miserably my first try.

To make it to the end you have to right at least 1667 words a day, but I suggest writing more on days when you can manage. It makes it so much easier, especially when you start running out of time. I was about three hours away from the deadline when I finished last year. XD

I suggest, if you can, writing on the computer. That way you don't have to count all your words by hand and you're an "official" winner. Because I'm in school and working all the time I have to write on paper and I'll tell you it takes a lot longer to count words then you would think.

As for my idea, I'm kind of stuck between following my series and writing the third and final book, or instead writing my comic out as a novel. I've done a lot more thinking on my comic, and it would make it much easier for me to write the comic if I already have a script written out. On the other hand I'd really like to work with something new and get some new ideas running. Well, I still have a month to decided, so it's good for now.

I am really really thinking I am going to. My friends are really pushing me to because they know I can write really well and this just might be what I need to turn those short stories I am always writing and turn them into something a little more.

I plan on writing on my computer, though I am hoping to get my laptop soon that way I can write while I am at work on break as well or when I have to be away.

Go for it!

Any idea what you're going to be writing about? I would advise building a plan before the start of November.

I tried to do it in '05, failed miserably at 16k because of a hell load of real life crap hit me.
In '06 I forgot about it - during '07 I had no time.
Really trying to do it this time - I made a deal with a real life friend. We're both going to do it - that way we actually have someone else who knows about it and all.

I have a basic idea for a storyline and wrote out a summary for somewhat like the first six chapters.
Got my basic information on my characters. Currently working on the setting. Trying to make myself a map.

At the same moment I am reworking some older stories to keep me from writing the story I planned for NaNo. It's damn hard not to write it as I have so much inspiration right now.

But hey, hopefully this means I'm going to finish it this year. Luckily it starts at a weekend so I can get ahead a bit, making sure school won't cause me to get far behind.

Another thing is that I write in Dutch, as this is my native tongue and I feel too tired to pull up a complete novel in English.
Maybe another time, but not this year.

Originally Posted by Sho-Shonojo

Go for it!

Any idea what you're going to be writing about? I would advise building a plan before the start of November.

Well I have this idea running around in my head for a sort of AU world much like one sees in the Kim Harrison or Laurell K Hamilton worlds where people know about vampires, witches, werecreatures...

But I wanted to make the main character...mortal. No special powers really she runs a small shop that caters to those creatures of the night, and thru her connections with the people who come in starts to get involved in something that is happening in their world.

That is my base idea. There is a power struggle between the vamps and the weres (I know done a million times) but I am not sure what yet, I am thinking of her being the reason but because she is mortal I am not sure yet. I have a couple ideas being something to do with her bloodline and that she is related to some great hero in their worlds or bears some striking resembalance to someone who is fortold to do something in prophecy.

Man I hope that makes sense.

Silenia: I know what you mean. Once I'm ready for NaNo to roll around I just can't wait to write! I just one to go for it already!

You sound really prepared. I never write notes, but probably should since I always seem to forget something or other. :sweat:

Bella Rose: Sounds like an interesting idea. Sure, the power struggle is an overdone idea, you just have to find away to make it completely original! My NaNo last year was about a princess who fell in love with someone she wasn't supposed to and saved her kingdom from destruction...well actually it was destroyed anyway. But, yea, it's hard to write a story that hasn't been done before.

I think that I'm just going to use NaNo this year to try and finish my one novel, so I won't technically be following the rules. I just like the pressure to write everyday as often as possible. I can't do that on my own time.

I'll be spending most of this month mapping out my storyline and writing up notes for my characters. The more preparation I have, the more likely I am to keep going and not get so stuck that I'm liable to give up. That's pretty much what happened last year. :oops:

I'm the same way Knerd! If I didn't have other stories to get writing, then I would probably be trying to finish up my past NaNo's. Actually, both of my past ones were rewrites of old stories that I completely revamped. So I wasn't completely following the rules either.

Good luck on getting prepared!

I've been working on the same novel for a few years now. I think I started it before my junior year of high school. I don't spend a whole lot of time actually writing it, but I enjoy drawing maps of my cities and playing around with different names. I hope to fully develop my entire fantasy world. To me, that's just as important as the story itself. :yes:

Have you ever finished during NaNo?

Oh I see. I think I've been working on my main story since middle school, and I'm in college now. But, it's gone through a lot of changes.

I've made it to 50,000 words before, but I wasn't able to finish the story. I've never finished any of my stories before.

Sho-Shonojo: I know. I finally have a story I have a good feeling with. As in, I think I can actually manage writing it. I mean, sometimes I even only decide what to write when I write. So different from the feeling I have now.
I tend not to make notes either, but as I am working on a total of eight different stories, have school and a job, I can be sure I'll forget it otherwise.
Usually life isn't quite as busy, but yeah.

Knerd: I get what you mean. I have one novel I have now almost finished which I have been working on for like, four years now.
But as I was 11 or 12 when I started writing it, my style and all have quite changed, so I'll probably have to rewrite it a lot.
I tend to rewrite even during the story itself (like, I write two pages, and rewrite them immediately before going on with the story) but am pretty producive at the same time.
Reached almost 10k of words one day - but I need to feel the story, I need to have inspiration and concentration. xD Which is quite hard sometimes, really. Have finally recovered from a writer's block which lasted 9 months.

Oh, yeah. Sho-Shonojo, I completely <3 your comic. xD

Wow, eight stories??? That is incredible. That's just like my sister. She's always coming up with new ideas but she doesn't write a lot. Then they sit and fester in her head until they're completely different. D: Well it's almost NaNo time so hopefully she'll get one of them down.

You rewrite your pages right after you write them??? :o Well, I'm more concerned with actually getting to the end of a story so I guess that why I don't let myself stop and suffer over every word. I just leave it alone for a month and then go back through the whole things and make corrections and write notes. D: 10k? That's amazing! :bows before the complete awesomeness of it: Beat that writers block!!

You like my comic? :oops: Thanks. I'm planning on writing it out for my NaNo so that I have a script ready and I don't get stuck.

Yeah, eight stories. Or actually, six stories I am or have been working actively at in the past three weeks. Two of them have a second version because I really couldn't choose which of them should happen. Then I have like, I don't know how many fragments lingering around. Usually handwritten, some at the computer.
Then there are like four stories I only put down the basic idea in about ten sentences,
Five or six stories I worked on (or tried to) actively during the past three months and a hell lot of stories it has been half a year or more since I worked on them, usually because I got struck thanks to the writer's block. Think that must be somewhere between ten and thirty.
And I don't know how many abandoned stories. xD
Yeah, I write much. Really much. xD

Yeah, practically. And when I continue writing a story, I first re-read all of it I wrote down (unless there are just too many pages. Then I limit myself to the last five or six pages), and this usually causes me to spot spelling errors, change sentences, make notes of whole pages I should change or work on - or just immediately change them. And only then it's time to continue the story.
Another thing that causes rewriting is that the main story is on the computer most of the time (although I have quite a few stories that are completely handwritten) - but at school I can't use a pc during lessons, so I write down complete scenes by hand. Then I have to type them out at the pc, usually change them already, etc.
But for me it works - I tend to type fast and think even faster. xD
10k, yes. But only handwritten, my record at the computer is somewhat like 8.5k at a day I think. Combining all I write in a day, both by hand and computer, I probably have reached 12k a couple of times. But then you have to type the whole damn thing out. -sighs-
(And yes, I usually count the words of my handwritten stories. By hand. I can tell you, counting 8000 words by hand... I just tend to count every page, put the amount of words somewhere and at the end I put the wordcount of all those pages together.

Yeah, I actually love it. And you're welcome. :) Sounds like a great idea to me.
It's really nice. :)

Wow, that is just....amazing. O.O I've been working on the same story, three novels since I was in middle school. I pretty much gave up everything else in order to work on those.

I struggle with just making the 1667, words a day suggestion by the NaNo people.

Why thank, though it's coming along much in the same way that you write. I already want to redraw and rewrite the first pages. XD

Nah, it's extremely annoying. Just writing on a story, then suddenly an idea pops into mind. I think a bit about it, often decide it does completely NOT fit with the story I am writing, then write it as a separate story.
I often still know at which page of which story I got which idea, etc. it can be quite annoying.
For me it depends a lot. Sometimes I only reach 500 words, other days I reach like, 8k.
Really depends on how much inspiration I have and how much time.
I get what you mean. I love all pages, but I must agree the drawing got better and better as the story developed.
But the first pages aren't bad or anything. xD

Wow, I don't really remember where most of my ideas popped out except that my first story idea just appeared because I wanted a story for a character that was just floating around. It's evolved from there.

It's not just the drawings, but also I just plunged into writing it, so I could have written the intro a little better to set it up for what happens later. Oh well, that's for the second draft. :3

Yeah, I get what you mean.
I have no idea why I remember all these unimportant little things - it's filling up my head, so that I can't seem to fit in whatever I want to remember some of the time.

Ah, yeah. I get what you mean. But hey, that's what a second draft is for. And while some things could have been done better, they are by no means bad.

Ha, I guess that is a downfall to remembering all sorts of little things.

Exactly. :)

Man I can't wait for NaNoWriMo to start. I've been writing tones of drabbles just to keep myself fresh and get everything that doesn't have to do with my NaNo story out of my mind.

Sometimes it comes in handy, sometimes not. (Man, together with a good friend of mine, we can literally quote half or whole pages of Harry Potter books. o_0)

Yeah, good luck on it. Reworking a story is probably easier than redrawing and rewriting a comic. xD If you ever want my opinion (not that I am anywhere near an expert, but hey. xD At least I am a fan, right?) just ask. xD

Same here. I can't wait for it to start.
Did two small drafts (a 5-minute wordwar and a 10-minute) from 209 and 493 words. xD
Well, thing is there was no real storyline behind them I had to stay in touch with, but if I manage to stay anywhere near this speed, I might get an easy NaNo this year.

Wow thats...odd. o.O

I love opinions on my work. I have no way of really knowing if everything makes sense when people don't leave comments. I have this problem with writing something and understanding it myself because I know all of it, but then other people look at it and they're confused because I didn't give enough information.

Yea, as long as nothing goes wrong this year, it should be good. I'm pretty happy that my college schedule has a three hour break in between two of my classes. I can drive over to that bookstore and just sit and write until my next class. :3

Oh! so cool that you made this thread :D
I just joined yesterday- never done it before but i heard about it from a friend recently.
Can't wait ><
i'm still brainstorming ideas for plot though- since i already so many other stories working right now. And it's hard- because if i think about a plot too much then i'll want to start writing now.

Oh, I always say I'm going to do it, but then when it comes around, I either get too busy or lose motivation. :lol:

Yay, another newbie! :)

It's gonna be great, I can't wait either. I know you don't want to tempt yourself to get started, but trust me when I say that getting prepared will really help you finish. I'm curbing my desire to start by writing other stuff, and writing notes for different key events that I want to happen.

When everyone else gets excited it gets me all pumped up again! :squee:


Aw Luenola Marxiel. :/ Come and struggle with us, it'll be fun...maybe...for the first day or two. :3 But, if you want to try this year I'll make sure to send you PM's to tell you to write.