Every November, thousands of creative folks band together to put their internal editors on vacation in the interests of pounding out 50,000 words of prose that may or may not be more appealing than raw sewage. But it really doesn't matter if the writing stinks. "Quantity over Quality" is the mantra echoed throughout the month.
NaNoWriMo (also shortened to just Wrimo) is the National Novel Writing Month. I've followed the progress of this event for the past five or six years, and it has always sounded like a cool thing for crazy people to do. Basically, participants write a novel in November. One month - 30 days - to write to the goal of 50,000 words.
Now, those 50,000 words may never see the light of day. They might even get flushed quicker than little Jimmie's dead goldfish. But nobody can take away the fact that those authors wrote 50,000 words in a month. And just like marathon runners, they get the satisfaction of knowing that for the rest of their lives.
And hey, some NaNoWriMo books actually get published, like Sara Gruen's Water for Elephants. It's being made into a movie starring Robert Pattinson!
Apparently, the possibility of writing a story for Robert Pattinson must have been the last straw, because this year I am officially insane enough to consider trying this crazy little endeavor. I have some character sketches I'm working on, along with an intriguing setting, and the beginnings of some plot ideas. The timing for actually starting on the project in earnest couldn't be better.
So, bright and early on November 1 I'll be writing till my fingers bleed (hopefully not literally) and blogging about the whole process, start to finish. The blogging part is not a casual afterthought. It's important, even vital, because it puts pretty significant pressure on me to follow through or risk public humiliation. No matter how ugly things get. Or sludgy.
Looks like the moment I hit publish on this post is the moment of no return . . .
Very cool! I had no idea that Water for Elephants started out this way. That is a very good book; one that I intend to re-read now that I know how it ends. I'll be keeping up with your progress...(pressure intended)
ReplyDeleteI thought you might like that little bit of info, Alicia! I still haven't read it. I have a whole stack of stuff I want to read, but not until December! Well, maybe little bits during breaks . . . I need to find a few books that aren't too hard to put down when it is time to get back to writing. Probably non-fiction, I guess, since I have a hard time putting novels down once I start them.
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