NaNoWriMo and the great word count issue...

Buy Links, reviews and excerpts

In 2010 I wrote my first NaNoWrimo novel. Back Home was a triumph of writing every day and actually finishing a novel in the month.

Of course, the pressure was intense. Not only are you needing to write 1667 words a day to achieve your target but you have other nano'ers posting how much they wrote.

Some days I managed 1667, others only 800, and then on a few shining days where I panicked I wrote 3000 words. After which I needed wine. Lots of wine.

The nano'ers I joined up with, of which Diane Adams was one, were all creating long important work, but I was creating a convoluted angst filled tale where even the blurb was difficult to write.

Writing MM and having to create a blurb that mentions brothers, ex boyfriends, and brother's boyfriend's dying, was like the worst kind of torture. Would have been much easier if the brother had a girlfriend, at least I would have had a *she* to use, instead of all the *he's* ROFL...

So, Kieran falls in love with his brother's boyfriend. More of a teenage crush. His brother's boyfriend was nice to him, his brother not so much. Kieran's brother. Not the boyfriend's brother...

See what I mean.

The the brother dies. Kieran's brother. Could Kieran come Back Home and build a life with his brother's boyfriend and confront ghosts of their past (Kieran and Jordan's - the boyfriend).

AHHHH too many Bs!

I love the story to Back Home. It's angsty and emotional, and by far the book has received the most consistent reviews. So my first ever Nano was a success. The book was picked up by a publisher and hit the shelves in 2011. People liked it. I could do this Nano thing. I had conquered it.

Then came 2011. ROFL... that was funny... I can't even remember what I wrote but I kind of recall giving up halfway through, simply due to commitments on editing and other stories I was in the middle of writing.

2012? You could write that off. I joined up, I sketched out details. The Schoolteacher and the Soldier (yes, this was Ellery 2).

The blurb was Luke Fitzgerald left Ellery Mountain for college and vowed never to come back. When his father is murdered and Luke is asked to come home to sell off his share of Ellery Mountain Cabins he meets the son of the other owner, ex-marine, Daniel Skylar.  It doesn’t matter what Daniel says, or how much he needs Luke; Luke isn’t staying once everything is sold off. Surely Daniel can understand that?

Is it cheating that I chose to do a series book for my Nano? Not so much, when after day one I realised I needed to be writing 4000 words a day so that I could move on to Ellery 3 and Worlds Collide (Sanctuary 7).

I achieved my 50,000 but not on anything in particular that I could physically track with the Nano scheme as a 50,000 word novel I created. Still I succeeded.

This year I haven't signed up. I wasn't giving Nano enough attention, or interacting with writing partners. I am a bad Nano'er.

I told myself in earlier Nano's that forcing myself to write 1667 words a day stifled my creativity, and despite the fact this was complete bollox, I used that excuse to avoid it all. Now I am writing full time having an aim in word count is how I work, and it doesn't seem to stifle my creativity at all.

My aims for November 2013 instead...

Edits on Montana 1... Ellery 7... Texas 5... Christmas In The Sun... 5,000 words a day each weekday, less at the weekend. This isn't all set in stone, but that is MY targets for November...

Let's see how it goes...

And good luck to anyone Nano'ing... it's intense but fun... :)

http://nanowrimo.org