November's Challenge: NaNoWriMo

If you are unfamiliar with this bizarre sounding word you are probably wondering what NaNoWriMo means.  Beyond being fun to say, it is an acronym for National Novel Writing Month; which is November.  An internet based writing project, it was established in 1999, with the idea of giving writers and dabblers an area in which they can challenge themselves, get advice, encouragement, and just have fun attempting to pound out 50,000 words in 30 days; in other words to write a very bare-bones basic novel.

I encourage anyone feeling inspired to partake of the challenge.

To sign up and get credit for your efforts create an account with the officials: http://nanowrimo.org/en/dashboard

I also recommend using an offsite page to do your writing to help you keep count of your words without bogging down a word document and to collect other fun and interesting data: 

http://750words.com/

Here are some tips from the experts @ nanowrimo.org

Tips to Get You from 0 to 50K

Before you head off to train those typing fingers, we wanted to offer a few bits of advice. You’ll find many great tips in the forums, and we’ll be sending pep talks directly to your NaNoMail (your on-site inbox) during November. But for now, here’s a quick overview of the three-and-a-half things we wish we had known for our first NaNoWriMo:

1) Its okay to not know what you’re doing. Really. You've read a lot of novels, so you’re completely up to the challenge of writing one. If you feel more comfortable outlining your story ahead of time, do it! But it’s also fine to just wing it. Write every day, and a book-worthy story will appear, even if you’re not sure what that story might be right now.

2) Do not edit as you go. Editing is for December and beyond. Think of November as an experiment in pure output. Even if it’s hard at first, leave ugly prose and poorly written passages on the page to be cleaned up later. Your inner editor will be very grumpy about this, but your inner editor is a nit-picky jerk who foolishly believes that it is possible to write a brilliant first draft if you write it slowly enough. It isn't. Every book you've ever loved started out as a beautifully flawed first draft. In November, embrace imperfection and see where it takes you.

3) Tell everyone you know that you’re writing a novel in November. This will pay big dividends in Week Two, when the only thing keeping you from quitting is the fear of looking pathetic in front of all the people who've had to hear about your novel for the past month. Seriously. Email them now about your awesome new book. The looming specter of personal humiliation is a very reliable muse.

3.5) There will be times you’ll want to quit during November. This is okay. Everyone who wins NaNoWriMo wanted to quit at some point in November. Stick it out. See it through. Week Two can be hard. Week Three is much better. Week Four will make you want to yodel.
And we’re talking the good kind of yodeling here.