We’re coming up to the wire now: Nanowrimo starts in less than 3 hours for me (on Eastern Daylight Time) and has already started in most of the world. So here’s my final post in the Nanowrimo prep series. I hope to do a couple posts during the month of November if I can tearContinue reading “Nanowrimo prep: Point of View”
Category Archives: Writing
Nanowrimo prep: Themes
I remember in high school, reading books like Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea and Steinbeck’s The Red Pony and having to identify the Christ metaphors and color symbolism. I knew without a doubt that no author would ever actually put this crappy symbolism stuff in their novel intentionally. Unless you were doing itContinue reading “Nanowrimo prep: Themes”
Nanowrimo prep: Setting
A lot of story planning can start with setting. Depending on the genre, you could come up with a whole series worth of plots, just from making a map and figuring out what kind of people live in the world you’ve created. The setting can (and should!) be a character in itself. It can helpContinue reading “Nanowrimo prep: Setting”
Nanowrimo prep: Making characters
We found out this really simple rule… We can take these beats, which are basically the beats of your outline, and if the words ‘and then’ belong between those beats, you’re fucked, basically. You’ve got something pretty boring. What should happen between every beat that you’ve written down is either the word ‘therefore’ or ‘but.’Continue reading “Nanowrimo prep: Making characters”
Nanowrimo prep: Outlining your novel
Nanowrimo is a month and a half away, and while technically the rules state that you can only start planning a week in advance, I say fuck the rules. If you want to end November with a novel you can actually do something with, you need a plan. Nanowrimo calls them planners and pantsers (asContinue reading “Nanowrimo prep: Outlining your novel”
The best laid schemes
I’d had every intention of starting Camp Nanowrimo by now, but events have conspired to keep me from even starting to think about my next project. Last Wednesday, my mother broke—nay, shattered—her ankle while walking on the beach. She is currently recovering from her first surgery and waiting for the second. The first surgery screwedContinue reading “The best laid schemes”
Endings suck
I’ve been in the process of writing the end of my novel for… well, months now. My wordcount goal for the book is 90,000-100,000 words, and at the moment I’m just around 91k. I’m so close to the end here, but writing it is like that paradox where each step you take halves the distanceContinue reading “Endings suck”
Nanowrimo post mortem
Happy December, everyone! I finished Nanowrimo a couple days early. I was on track to finish on the 30th, but around the 25th I decided to do a push and finish the last 10k in two days to get it done before Thanksgiving. This was mostly so my eternal rival Rob wouldn’t finish ahead ofContinue reading “Nanowrimo post mortem”
Nanowrimo metrics
We’re more than halfway through Nanowrimo by now. This is my 11th Nanowrimo, and I’m sticking with the usual goal of 50k. In the past I’ve done 100k or even, one excruciating year, 150k, but that’s not something I can manage this time. This time of year is always filled with debate over whether NanowrimoContinue reading “Nanowrimo metrics”
NaNoWriDay post mortem
So the results are in, and NaNoWriDay was a bit of a disappointment. I think in my case it was kind of like trying to run a marathon without any sort of preparation. I could probably have done it, but I should have built up to it. I ended up with 10,048 words after 18Continue reading “NaNoWriDay post mortem”
