Lake Neuron

I am trying to decide if I want to participate in National Novel Writing Month again this year, and if so whether I want to continue on with my characters from last year — writing a sequel of sorts, which could possibly be combined with what I wrote last year into a single manuscript — or try something new.

Last year, I had a blast. My main characters were more personal to me than I’d first intended, and I think the novel was sort of cathartic as a result. I was also coming to terms with having broken up with my girlfriend. I had dated her for a year, and it was the longest relationship I’d ever had, and the fact that I really didn’t love her made me question whether I was so self-centered, and so used to being on my own, that I just am not cut out for a relationship. So it was sort of wish fulfillment to have my main character win his dream girl — in fact, they ended up getting together much earlier in the novel than I first intended.

I am proud of what I wrote last year, although I don’t really think it’s marketable. It doesn’t really fit in a genre, and yet it doesn’t have the dramatic heft to be capital-L Literature. Of course, I really haven’t shown much discipline about sitting down and rewriting it. (There is, in fact, a National Novel Editing Month, but I did not participate.)

So part of me wants to try something more creative, and potentially more marketable, this year, just to see if I can do it.

For those of you who aren’t familiar, NaNoWriMo — as participants call it — is an exercise in which you attempt to write a 50,000-word novel entirely during the month of November. This is a ridiculous goal, and in order to meet it you have to turn off your internal editor and just write whatever pops into your head, an average of 1,666 words a day. In retrospect, you find that while some of what you’ve written sounds speed-written, there are also flashes of creativity that you might never have gotten given the opportunity to talk yourself out of things. The point is not that your finished product be the Great American Novel; the point is simply to make yourself write, every day, without excuses.

The web site allows you to register, and then you voluntarily report your word count from time to time during the month (it’s on the honor system). There are discussion forums, by topic, by genre and by region, and some writers even hold get-togethers during the month to encourage each other.

Those who reach the 50,000-word mark, as I did last year, earn the right to download a certificate which they can print out and a special icon which they can display on their web site.

I found out about NaNoWriMo last year from Blogger, which was how this blog was maintained at the time. I set up a separate blog and posted my novel as I wrote it, something Blogger had suggested. But, towards the end of the month, I reached the end of my plot and had to go back and insert some earlier scenes in order to get to 50,000. The rewriting that required was difficult to synch up with the blogged version of the novel, and so I took the blog down. I was shocked to find that a couple of people had actually been keeping up with the novel and complained about this. I offered to send a couple of them the final MS by e-mail.

I don’t necessarily plan on blogging the novel this year, although I could easily change my mind about any of this between now and Nov. 1.

Tags: Novel