It’s That NaNoWriMo Time of Year!

By Lisa Fary

What’s more stressful than putting yourself through the National Novel Writing Month gauntlet? Publishing the day’s work in a public arena like Pink Raygun. No plot, no problem? Ummm. OK.

The goal of NaNoWriMo is to write 50,000 words of the first draft of a novel in 30 days, starting today. John and I had the thought It would be fun if we did it together! Let’s put our efforts on the website, too!

So, we each have our own novel and our own way of preparing for NaNoWriMo.

John is doing the equivalent of marathon training, constantly thinking about his novel, outlining, character sketching, vocalizing ideas a few times a day, talking out how it’s going to end, working out themes, determining what he wants to say with it.

It’s actually really cute.

I don’t have any of that. I’m not doing anything to get myself ready and have nothing terribly detailed for the novel. My plan goes as far as Character A does action B, discovers thing C, and takes action D. On that, I’ll hang 50,000 words.

John has been trying to get me to do it, though. Sometimes I’m game, but most of the time, I just don’t want to talk about it, don’t want to think about it too much before hand lest I feel trapped later on. I like outlining in my head, writing a scene until I get bored with it, then ending it and going somewhere else.

The differences between John and I are funny in this case because it’s really the opposite of what we normally do. John is usually Mr. Zen Navigation, and I’m the one with the plan, the maps, and the directions.

Part of what I like about NaNoWriMo is the focus on quantity, not quality. The time crunch is a constant reminder that it’s only a first draft and an encouragement to practice what I preach to my writing students every year:

Let yourself go and don’t worry about it. The important thing is getting the words out.

At an average of 5.5 double spaced pages per day for the entire month, that’s all I’m going to be able to do – get the words out. If I’m going to do NaNoWriMo, keep up with Pink Raygun, and do my actual real life job, there won’t be time to think too much about what the hell I’m doing.

It took me about 2.5 months to finish the first draft of my first novel, Bruja-ha, (which is currently in third draft hell) and that comes in at just over 70,000 words. I’m hoping this bodes well for a possible win at NaNoWriMo 2009.

Lisa Fary is a graduate of the creative writing program at Florida State University and holds an advanced degree in Special Education. Her earliest influences are Princess Leia, Rainbow Bright, Astronaut Barbie, and her 6th grade teacher, Ms. Palmer. She’s angry that it’s almost 2010 and she still doesn’t have a hovercraft, but will accept a jetpack as consolation. That jetpack had better be pink with a rhinestone monogram.

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