Today's guest post is from fellow author Jean Rabe whose new book, The Dead of Winter, A Piper Blackwell Mystery, releases today!!! (Click the title to get your copy in print and Kindle, and Kindle Unlimited!!)
If you're interested in writing, today is also the start of NaNoWriMo. Me? Um, well, no. I signed up one year. I can use the push, but I'm a firm believer in putting in quality, not quantity. It's useless to fill up pages just to fill them and then have to do it over and heavily re-edit. If you're a tight and fast writer then it works. It's a way to get the words down. I have a novella I'm working on and plan to push myself to get in the words but not in a contest-kind of way. I keep track. Daily word counts are good. Writing is not a race. Just. Keep. Writing.
That said, Jean's a fan - she's also a fast, and prolific, writer. Here's her take on it. She actually makes it sound fun. I went to the NaNo group with her one year. It was good to mingle. That can be fun, too.
NaNo NaNo NaNo
By Jean Rabe
November is National Novel
Writing Month - NaNoWriMo
You’ve probably seen it mentioned
in writer-threads, Facebook, Twitter, bandied about as a topic in local writing
groups. Only once through the years was I successful in talking a member of my
writing group into NaNoing with me. And that person was a published
author—short stories, newspaper articles, magazine features, and novels. She’s
participated in multiple NaNos. The other writers in that group, some of whom
have sold short stories, all of whom are working on novels but have never sold
one, would not participate.
They said they didn’t have time.
They said the rigors of writing
50,000 words in one month were too demanding.
That’s probably why they don’t
have finished novels.
Can’t find enough time to write
that much, they said, too demanding to finish. Not up to the challenge of
crossing the finish line and sticking -30- on the last page, I say.
Writing is never about finding
the time.
Writing is about making the time. Taking the time. Stealing
the time away from other things to write.
It’s about looking in the mirror
and asking: How bad do I want it?
Supposedly NaNoWriMo was started
to help newbie authors get that jump-start on their novel. But I know a lot of
veteran oft-published authors who participate every year. Actually, I know far
more veterans who sign on than aspiring novelists. I’m one of the veterans. I
have 36 published novels, about 100 published short stories (maybe more, but I
haven’t bothered to count), edited a couple dozen anthologies, and edited more
than 100 issues of various magazines.
So, yeah, I’m a veteran. My
friends tell me I don’t need NaNoWriMo.
Yeah, I do need NaNoWriMo.
Its things like NaNoWriMo that
make me a veteran.
It serves as my
I-want-to-write-this-book-but-don’t-have-a-contract-or-deadline-for-it churning
blast. NaNo is my contract with myself, and my deadline for 50,000 words. It’s
my nudge. It is my put-the-butt-in-the-chair, put-the-fingers-on-the-keyboard,
until I finish 50,000 words. Or more. It is my whoooo-hooooo-let’s-do-this Fall
event.
This November I will use NaNo to
get a jump on The Dead of Night, the
sequel to The Dead of Winter,
releasing Nov. 1 by Imajin. I’m working on the outline for the book now. It’s
fair game in NaNo to outline your novel ahead of time. You just can’t start writing
chapter one until Nov. 1.
It’s perfect for me, The Dead of Winter releasing on the day I start The Dead of Night. Something
appropriately poetic about that, dontcha think? I used a previous NaNo to start
The Dead of Winter—which was runner
up in Killer Nashville’s prestigious Claymore Awards. Hmmm…guess I better come
up with another “Dead” book for NaNo 2017, eh?
Need or Want?
So, yeah, I need NaNoWriMo. Or at
least I think I do. And that’s basically the same thing.
I’m suggesting to any aspiring
novelist reading this to give NaNo a try.
There are a bunch of great perks.
·
You
can meet locally with other writers taking the plunge, usually in coffee shops
and restaurants; nice chance to socialize and chat about writing and books. You
might make some new friends or find (or create) a regular writing group.
·
Your
email box will fill with inspiring essays by top-notch pros discussing writing.
Many of the essays are by bestselling authors. And NaNo alone is worth it to
get this inspiration and advice.
·
It
serves as an opportunity to lock yourself away, ignoring family and friends for
30 days, telling them you’ve made a commitment to this contest. And it is a
contest…can you write 50,000 words in one month (that’s less than 1,700 words a
day)? Can you win? You still win if you don’t hit the word mark, ‘cause you’ve
gotten something down on your manuscript.
·
It
is a chance to kick the excuses of why you can’t do it to that proverbial curb.
·
It
will turn you into a sorcerer…you will have ‘made’ time, ‘created’ time, rather
than to have simply found it.
INFO:
And here is one of those
articles, this one about handling the 30-day keyboard binge:
Now, I gotta close out this
little blog because I need to finish my outline for The Dead of Night…because NaNoWriMo, like Winter, is coming.
If you’re interested in checking
out a novel that I started on NaNoWriMo and sold during the summer, here you
go….
USA Today
Bestselling author Jean Rabe
has written 35 fantasy, urban fantasy, and science fiction novels. The Dead of Winter, her 36th,
is her first mystery. She has roughly 100 short stories in print, has edited a
couple dozen anthologies, and has edited more magazines than she cares to
tally. When she isn’t writing or editing, she tosses tennis balls to her cadre
of dogs, visits museums, and tries to find gamers who will play Axis &
Allies with her.
