Turning on the lights and dusting off the blog.
Gearing up for NaNoWriMo 2008
This time last year I was excited by the prospect of another NaNoWriMo. This year – eh, not so much.
I have an idea why that is. My attitude toward writing runs in cycles from complete mania to avoidance. Back in August, I was eager with anticipation that NaNoWriMo 2008 would be under way in only a few months. I wrote essays and blog entries and worked feverishly on the third draft of my novel from NaNo ‘07’. I read every writing book and magazine I could get my hands on with one of my favorite being ‘Zen and the Art of Writing’ by Ray Bradbury – who turned 88 in August.
By early September, I exhausted my enthusiasm and energy for writing. I turned my attention back to my other interests in option trading and photography. The writing (outside of blog entries) has come to a halt. Even reading works of fiction has slowed to a trickle. These are not good things – 30 days from beginning a new novel.
Does this mean I won’t be participating in NaNoWriMo 2008? No, not at all. This will be my eighth year participating and can’t imagine giving up on it now.
Despite not being “in the mood” and even uninspired to write – write I will. Any real writer afflicted with that incurable writing bug, will tell you that even when you don’t want to write the overriding urge to write is always there – almost like an addiction. There’s that intuitive nudge, that deep gut feeling that’s telling you, “G’head, turn on the pc, open a new Word doc and start typing.” You try to suppress it, but it persists. Eventually, you do give into the impulse. It can take a while, but the writing bug wins every time.
I do have a four page overview/outline for the story I am going to write, however, I have not figured out the ending yet. I’ve worked on it on and off since April.
Reading about the writing process has instilled in me some basic strategies to get and keep me writing this year. I am going to approach it as a business.
- When you run a business it’s something you want to do and like to do. You do something productive with it almost every day. Approaching the writing as a business, all I need to do is write at least 1,667 words-a-day to make the 50k goal.
- If you approach writing a story as a job – a job is often associated with something unenjoyable and a chore. With a job, you are only required to be productive five days-a-week. It would allow you to take weekends off, however, you’d have to produce 2,500 words a day to make the 50k goal.
Since I enjoy doing my own thing and ultimately enjoy writing, the business approach works for me. It’s something you need to do, have to do – even on the days you don’t want to – in order to ensure your ongoing long-term survival. Yep, write to live and live to write.
Another thing I took reassurance from what I’ve read is that on average you will need to produce 1,000,000,000 (One Million) words of story before you write something truly publishable. This is true. Over the last three novels I completed, there is remarkable improvement with each successive one.
After completing the first two, upon going back later to revise them, they were so horrible, they stunk so badly, that I put them away never to be looked at again. The one I produced last year, however, was much better. So much so, that I am almost finished with the third draft/revision of it.
After I complete this year’s novel, I should be even more pleased with my efforts, and will be that much closer to the million word mark.
Posted by WFMeyer 
Posted by WFMeyer 
Posted by WFMeyer 
