NaNoWriMo 2014!

[wag]

NoNoWriMo is upon us in a mere day and some hours (depending on your timezone)! Is anyone here participating and interested in some group encouragement and/or friendly competition?

If you're not familiar: NaNoWriMo, short for National Novel Writing Month, is an annual mass writing exercise that takes place during the month of November. The goal of participants is to begin writing on November 1st and to reach a full novel of 50,000 words by 11:59PM on November 30th.

For the most part, it's a self-imposed challenge geared towards producing quantity over quality, and there aren't any prizes or rewards aside from overwhelming self-gratification and a large text file. That said, it's a neat idea for those of us who enjoy the idea of writing but have trouble finding the motivation to go ahead and commence the wordin'.

I've participated every year since at least 2009 (going by memory - I only have records to 2010) and though I've never completed it (or come even remotely close), it's always been fun, and it did teach me a few things for when/if I ever want to really write a novel.

Let me know if you're in! If you'd rather communicate on the NaNo site, drop me a line there - here's my profile.

[Fay V]

I've considered it, unfortunately november is the worst month as far as timing goes. I guess I'll see how things go tomorrow to decide whether or not I want to try.

[Manna]

they chose november so they can get the artist right when their seasonal depression starts to kick in

[Jess Quna]

I'll probably try (and probably fail).. writer's block likes me too much :s

[Gnarl]

I am afraid that I will have to pass, I am currently 75,000 words into a novel and not seeing the end yet. There is a slight possibility but that will depend on when I finish this book, plus I take a week in November for hunting!

[Onomatopoeia]

I've tried Nanawrimo before. Didn't pan out.

Quantity of words is easy. Wham bam bing bong shakazulu purple orange apple pear purple lame history people individual iteration hero you telemarketer fucking words man.

What's the use of quantity over quality.

[wag]

I've tried Nanawrimo before. Didn't pan out.

Quantity of words is easy. Wham bam bing bong shakazulu purple orange apple pear purple lame history people individual iteration hero you telemarketer fucking words man.

What's the use of quantity over quality.

Good question! It's not EXACTLY quantity over quality - it's just generally so. It would be easy to copy+paste "all work and no play makes jack a dull boy" 5000 times to hit the needed word count. Anyone can do that, but would anyone consider it an accomplishment?

A lot of the problem I have with writing is that I will start with an idea that I like, but regardless of how I go about it, I'm displeased with how I've tried to express the idea. It might be too short, or missing detail, or doesn't paint a vivid enough mental picture for my liking, or maybe it DOES do all of these but it's just too damn long in that section and interrupts with the pacing and flow of the read. I will get so caught up in accurately portraying details that I can't progress with anything else. This happens with short stories, essays, response questions on exams, forum posts (yes, right now!), IRC conversations... pretty much anything involving more than a small handful of words.

The way I like to think of NaNoWriMo is that someone else also had this problem, and figured out the way to get around it would be to impose a time limit to reach the goal - sort of a way to say "you don't have time to worry about the exact details, you have more to get to". It's not entirely omitting quality, but it is more of an exercise in balancing quality with quantity in such a way that you can't get stuck solely on one so much that it sacrifices the other.

The end result, or what I HOPE to get out of it, is an understanding of how to balance the two in such a way that I end up with a somewhat finished product that isn't utter garbage. I realize I'm not going to write something in the span of this month that's good or even probably readable, but I'm hoping to learn some ways that should I ever sit down to write something that WILL end up that way, I won't get frustrated halfway through the first chapter and shelve it permanently. At minimum, I'd like to finish and look back at what I've completed and see some kind of progress, at least enough to let me look at it and think "wow, I did it" and check it off the bucket list. This may be a little different than what others are hoping for, but as far as my take on the exercise, that's how I see it.

Looking back at this reply, how the hell do I have any kind of problem writing large amounts? Wow.

[Jess Quna]

I've tried Nanawrimo before. Didn't pan out.

Quantity of words is easy. Wham bam bing bong shakazulu purple orange apple pear purple lame history people individual iteration hero you telemarketer fucking words man.

What's the use of quantity over quality.

I'm in it the first time now and I can honestly say: yes that would make it easier, but it doesn't make me a writer.

You can win a hard copy/soft copy/ebook of your story (depending on what you prefer I guess) and you only have to pay for the mailing costs... For me, whose dream it is to become a writer, that's a big deal. If I want a hardcopy of my book, it better not have something like that in it or I won't even order it even if it's free.

I'm serious about writing, so I won't do that. I suck at descriptions, I often forget to describe a room or a person even. The rule of having to make 50k for that printed book, forces me to write a description. I hate editing am terrible at it, again I'm forced to, I don't want to finally have a printed book only to notice that half of the words are spelled wrong. And then there's my writersblock, I often have one and I won't stop thinking and try and force me past that chapter which has me stonewalled. Now I'm on a deadline, so if something doesn't work out or I'm stuck because I did it one way and not the other, I concede and rewrite it until it suits my needs. It actually helps me grow. Besides, even if I don't make a 50k, if I finish my story that would be fine as in the end, I'd be happy with it and there's always next year.

[Cheetahs]

I finished it! Didn't actually go with a novel this time though. I made a collection of stories and upped the word count every time I Finishes a project. Managed to go up to 82.453 words or so thanks to some hardcore writing days and a lot of staying at home. I am confident I can do more though. Once you go hardcore on writing, there is no coming back.

[Damian]

I completely missed it. I was two weeks in November when I realized "SHIT!"

I had irl stuff going on anyway but I still wanted to participate. Figure I'll just write more (or try to) regardless of month.