NaNoWriMo

NaNoWriMo Will Not Orphan the Blog

/ Renaissance Gamer / 3 Comments

If you read my previous post, you know that NaNoWriMo is upon us!  I want to assure my tens of readers that my participation in that will not slow down blog entries at all.  I’ve found, as have other writers have, that the more I write the more I am able to write, limited only by the number of hours in the day.  So the posts will still happen, though individual posts may be a bit shorter for the next month.

But, lucky you!  I’ll also share the odd (and I promise they’ll be odd) excerpts from my burgeoning novel, and you can track my progress.  If you want to follow my progress throughout the month, you can check me out through my NaNoWriMo profile.  And to celebrate my fresh start, here is a small excerpt from today’s writing:

Sighing, Michael drew a red line through another few lines of text. In the margin he scribbled some notes for the paper’s author, and flipping to the front page jotted down a grade and further comments. “Not your best work, I expect better next time.” Did he, though?

Michael rubbed his eyes, and then stared at the still unmarked pile of student essays. How many more times am I going to write this tonight, he wondered, not for the first time. That familiar thought led his mind to consider how many times he had already written that same comment, but as always he gave up on the tally. Too many students with too many papers over so many years… Such was the lot of an English professor. He could always switch credentials, move to another town, teach something else at another university. Math, maybe, or psychology. Not history, of course; that would be a little too “on the nose”. But surely another identity would be less work than this…

Sighing again, Michael reached for the next paper in the stack. No, that is just my poor lazy brain talking. I have a nice life here despite my whining. If grading papers is the worst thing I have to put up with today, the day is pretty damn good.

In one of life’s little joking moments, that was when the bullet smashed through the office window.

And so on.  Michael’s adventures will continue through the month, and we’ll see where this crazy ride takes me.  I do have an outline, but sometimes the outline comes off the rails due to inspiration and I think this may end up being the case.  Stay tuned to see.

If you are taking part in NaNoWriMo, come be my Writing Buddy; you can find me as RenaissanceDork on the site or follow the link above.  The more support/peer pressure we have the better chance we have of finishing, so let me hear from you!

Have a comment about NaNoWriMo? Want to tell me that my excerpt is a) awesome or b) fantastic? Comments are just below…

The Gathering is Upon Us: NaNoWriMo

/ Renaissance Gamer / 2 Comments

Full disclosure: yes, I do equate NaNoWriMo with The Gathering from Highlander.  Because a) I am a huge nerd, and b) Queen is the best writing music ever!

Once more NaNoWriMo is upon us!  For those not in the know, National Novel Writing Month is an annual event encouraging people to write 50 000 words of a novel over the course of November.  NaNoWriMo is the perfect event for anyone who feels they have a novel in them, but have had trouble getting started.  To quote from the official website:

“Because of the limited writing window, the ONLY thing that matters in NaNoWriMo is output. It’s all about quantity, not quality. This approach forces you to lower your expectations, take risks, and write on the fly.

Make no mistake: You will be writing a lot of crap. And that’s a good thing. By forcing yourself to write so intensely, you are giving yourself permission to make mistakes. To forgo the endless tweaking and editing and just create. To build without tearing down.”

This is what has attracted me to NaNoWriMo in the past.  Years back, I actually completed a 50 000 word “novel” during the event.  (What happened to it?  Let’s just say it was merciful and quick. And I’m a man now.)  But without the push that NaNoWriMo gave me I would never have made the attempt, and the doing was the important thing in this case.  Yes, the result was so bad I destroyed it rather than infect the minds of others.  But forcing myself to write every day, and more importantly write without self-criticism, was the best thing I could have done for myself.

That’s why the time has come for me to enter the fray once again.  Yes, for the first time in many years I will test my mettle ‘gainst the blank screen, and I will emerge victorious!  On November 30 I will survey the screen, the vanquished words piled high around me, and only then will I set down my keyboard… (cue Bagpipes)

Now I’m sure not any kind of NaNoWriMo veteran, but if you would enter fight by my side here is some advice that will help you rack-up the word count and get to the end:

1)  Make an Outline – I did this the first time I participated, but not the second. Result? I finished the first time and not the second.  And then didn’t participate again for a while.  Your outline is going to be your rock; besides keeping you on task, it can help keep you motivated, get you excited about your story again.  Make sure there is enough detail in the outline to be useful, but don’t write a novel when you write your outline.  I keep mine purposefully brief by writing it out on index cards; one per major scene/plot point, plus one card per main character.  You can also find outline helpers online (Splashnotes or Freemind, for instance), and both Google Docs and MS Office can be used to outline.

2)  The magic number is 1667, not 50 000 – 1667 is the daily word count you need to hit if you are going to get all 50 000 words by the end of the month.  Or if you plan to take weekends off, you’ll need to achieve 2273 per weekday.  Either way, keep that number firmly in your mind.  Thinking about 50 000 words every day is going to make this overwhelming, so don’t do it.  This is about quantity not quality, remember?  So start each day with the thought that you have zero words, and you need 1667.  Hit that daily total and then reward yourself; high-five the cat, have coffee with cream, whatever does it for you.  Do that thirty times and boom, you’re done.  Should you keep writing even after you’ve made your daily quota?  I would say yes, as long as you don’t use it as an excuse to let the next day slide.  Remember, every day starts at zero.

3)  The Process is the Goal – This is important.  NaNoWriMo will give you many things: confidence in your writing, a sense of accomplishment, new habits and tools to improve your future work, and connection to a wider community.  The true goal of NaNoWriMo is helping you develop these things.  If you have managed to find a new way into your writing, then you have reached your goal.  But what about the 50 000 word novel, you might ask.  Oh, be proud of that too, but know that 50 000 words is not a novel.  Most novels fall in the 80 000 to 120 000 word range, so you have at least 30 000 more words to go.  If you want to shoot for that after NaNoWriMo, excellent!  Keep to your word count and you’ll get there in 18 more days.  At that point, your copy will be ready for editing, which will drop it below 80 000 words, which will mean more writing… Not trying to scare you off, but I am trying to illustrate why bothering the nice publisher with your “manuscript” on December 1 is a mistake.  Enjoy the journey, not the destination.

I hope I see you on the battlefield, fellow NaNoWriMo-ers!  Songs will be sung of our glory!

(For your edification this post is coming in at 916 words, roughly half of your necessary word count.  Knowing is half the battle…)

Are you jumping into NaNoWriMo this year?  Are you too scared?  Comment below…

Humpday Links for October 5

/ Renaissance Gamer / Leave a comment

Fall is here in the Great Metropolitan Republic of Edmonton, and it has brought us all the grey skies and rain.  So I feel it incumbent upon me to provide you with a particularly entertaining and distracting series of links this week.  I think I have done so, but only you, my tens of readers, can act as final arbiter to my success.  Without further delay, enter my link parlour:

– Have you heard Adam WarRock rap about Firefly yet? Here, let me help you…

– It may come as no surprise that I am a huge Terry Pratchett fan, and would step over your Gran to live in Discworld.  Okay, maybe that second part would.  In any case, I am going to be all over this Discworld boardgame; to my circle of gaming friends, expect to play it A LOT!

– While Gary Gygax gets a lot of well-deserved kudos for D&D, it is important to remember Dave Arneson’s contribution, as Geekdad correctly reminds us.

– This one is for the Portal fans out there…so pretty much all of you, in one way or another.  I give you Aperture: A Triumph of Science.  Cake will be served afterwards in the lobby.

– If you are considering taking part in National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo as it is often rendered on protective amulets, Terrible Minds has some things you should know.

– Want to see something charming and geeky?  Look no further…

– If you are like me, ten seconds after getting on Twitter you were looking for a way to play an RPG with it.  Lucky for both of us, there is Tweet RPG!

– My love for Geek TV is well documented by both myself and my therapist.  Here is my latest web series crush: Standard Action.

– Okay, don’t tell Standard Action because it’d be devastated, but I’m also crushing on Metagame.  Hey, the geek wants what the geek wants!

– Want to learn how to make snazzy digital maps for your RPG?  A Walk in the Dark will help you do just that!

– It seems contract disputes could put and end to The Simpsons and Dexter.  Well, they’ve had a good life…

– If you thought forum or comment trolls were bad, may I present to you an example of a patent troll.

– Want a sneak peak at the coming season of Walking Dead?

– Felicia Day would like you to watch the trailer for Dragon Age: Redemption. Given how bad-ass she looks in it, I would comply.

– I’m hoping he will reconsider, but I can certainly understand: Leonard Nimoy has bid farewell to the convention circuit.  Live Long and Prosper.

– And finally, I will leave you with a little tech perspective: computer memory then and now.  For the record, 1980 is when I started playing D&D.  I was ten.  Yes, I am old.

And that is all the linkage for this week’s humpday.  As always, if you have any links to share just place them in the comments below. One per comment, though, or else my spam filter will eat you.  Cheery-pip!