ooh, it's that time again

[pauraque_bk]

Time to sign up for NaNo! If you're doing it this year, feel free to buddy me, though I don't think it actually does anything.

whee!

Comments

[muridae-x.livejournal.com]

Hey, I think you dragged me to the finish line last year!

I'm considering having a go at it again, though it depends on whether Insane Working Schedule finishes at the end of October as currently scheduled, or drags into November. If I end up working a weekend in November then I've not got a prayer of making that 50,000 words.

Of course, I do need to come up with a plot first, or it won't matter if I'm working or not. :-)

[pauraque]

I think I know what I'm going to write about, but I'm not sure if it's a novel-length idea, or if I should save it for a short story.

I hope you can do it again, it's more fun with friends. :)

[bowdlerized.livejournal.com]

Do you have any (or have any links to) tips n tricks? I'm interested but I started (barely) last year and didn't get anywhere. My writing and characters are good but I really suck at the plot part and I have such problems doing it quickly.

[pauraque]

Well, you're allowed to use a previously-written plot outline as long as it's not part of your word count, so that might help you. I'm terrible with plot too, so I didn't worry about making it cohesive or writing it all in chronological order. If I got stuck I just went "blah de blah something plotty happens, and now they're driving away" or whatever, and came back to the "something", or more likely didn't come back to it. I didn't try to make it done and polished, just to come up with as many ideas and scenes as I could.

I have a hard time typing first drafts because I edit too much, so I did almost all of mine on paper and typed it when I thought I had enough. Obviously that takes more time, but the inability to backspace may help you quit stopping and trying to fix what you've written. If you get very far with it you quickly acquire the attitude of not caring that the paragraph you just wrote is crappy. At least it's written, and now you move on to something else.