Nanowri-FAIL, and November in General

Well, it doesn’t come as much as a surprise, to be honest. I had a very productive weekend when I started Nano, but on the Tuesday after I stopped writing. The workload this month has been just too heavy to even write a few measly words for a novel. I think it’s something I can use in the future, and the opening of it is something I’m using as part of my creative writing assignment.

Ho hum. Next year, maybe. Or perhaps not. I imagine I’ll be in dissertation mode next year. The year after then. When I’m in a job, and have spare time at home without homework. I’m looking forward to a life where I can leave work at work, and make my time spent at home spent living (ie: eating, washing, housework, shopping, and [hopefully] relaxing).

It’s close to the end of November now, which is very scary. Christmas is now officially less than a month away. I’m going shopping with my family tomorrow, which I’m looking forward to, but it doesn’t make the impending doom of Christmas and the end of this semester any easier to accept. I just don’t understand where the time’s gone. November has vanished in a blur of essays, family flying in from the States, and illness.

Anyway, I’ll be posting another post later this evening. I’ve nearly finished a book (shock horror!). I’ve had so little time to read stuff I want to, and even this book is one I bought primarily for my course. But it’s good so I’ll write about it. And perhaps I’ll write a review of Pamela to vent my frustration as well.

Adios, amigos!

Nanowrimo Update: 4,170

I know, I know, this is my second post today. My second post in about two hours in fact. But I’ve made some good headway with my Nano novel.

I’m up to 4,170 words, which means I’ve done the equivalent to two days of regular nanowriting. Hopefully I’ll be able to get a lot more done tomorrow and be well on the way to 50K.

The story is coming well. I’ve attempted to start it a couple of times before, but I’ve thought about it and mulled it over for the past couple of weeks. I developed some momentum, and hopefully the steam will continue to keep it running through tomorrow and for the rest of November.

This is probably a very badly worded blog, but I’m very tired and I just wanted to give a quick update on my reasonably successful first Nanowrimo day.

So I’ve Given into Pressure

I’ve actually decided to start NaNoWriMo after all. I’m nearly a week late, but I couldn’t help myself.

I saw various blogs on here dedicated to the contest, and also did a search for #nanowrimo on Twitter. I guess I just got drawn in by the sense of community.

I might be a week later than everybody else, but I’ll definitely give it a good go. I’ve only been writing for about an hour and I’ve already got 2,226 words. I worked out how many I need to do per day if I started now, and it came to around 2,175, so I’m still on target. I’m going to leave it for today and hope that I can catch up further tomorrow.

The story is going strongly at the moment. I feel like I could write for longer, but I’m very aware that my housemate has just gone to bed and is literally just behind the wall that my desk is against. My typing must be a very irritating, very irregular tapping. Maybe I’ll move my laptop onto my bed so I can work for a little longer.

But anyway, here’s to starting Nano again! Albeit a bit late. Perhaps this novel will be something I can use in my creative writing classes. Two birds with one stone comes to mind.

A bit of information about the novel:

It’s a kind of fantasy, psychological, armageddon type thing that I can’t really place. One of the main themes is the difference (or lack thereof) between the real world and the world of dreams. My character is undergoing therapy, and the book is essentially her story about growing up differently to everybody else and becoming isolated. I think the general idea is strong enough to keep going for 50,000 words, despite the lack of preparation. It’s been mulling in my mind for a couple of weeks, though, if that counts.

I’ll keep you updated on how it’s going!

Targets give you something to shoot for

A new month, and I’ve given myself a deadline. 10th September, my last day in America. I chose this day in mind that I can print it out and do a bit of editing on the seven hour flight back to the UK.

My target word count is 50,000 words. This is taken from the Nanowrimo target, though I’ll not be doing it in November, and I’ve given myself a bit more than a month. Nanowrimo (NAtional NOvel WRIting MOnth)  is something I recommend to get into the practise of writing lots, regularly.

Using these targets, I’ve given myself a daily word count to reach each day. This amounts to 1156 words, which is less than an hour’s work. Breaking it down into these bitesize chunks have made the whole prospect of writing a full-length novel less daunting.

I only created these targets yesterday, but already I can tell that they’re helping. Yesterday I wrote 1510 words, and today I have already written 1279, bringing my total so far to 8539. No, I haven’t got that good a memory; I’m keeping track of my progress using Excel graphs. It’s nice to have a visual representation of how much work I’m doing each day.

All this together should make writing this novel feel a lot easier; it’ll give me concrete objectives that I can meet and then feel accomplished about, and makes me realise that my work in progress is, in fact, in progress.

So, my advice to any new authors out there is this; set yourself targets. It really does make all the difference in knowing whether you’re on track, or need to work a little harder to catch up again.