Friday, December 05, 2014


Okay, so this blog has been semi-comatose for a while, but I do have an excuse...for the month of November, anyway. See graphic above. YES, I actually won NaNoWriMo this year! I wrote a 50,000 word novel between Nov. 1 - Nov. 30. Hallelujah!

This was my fourth attempt at NaNoWriMo. I entered in 2010 and made it to around 10,000 words before running out of inspiration for that particular project. I still have what remains of the manuscript, so it's something I may go back to at some point. I tried NaNo again in 2012 (working title: Wreckage), but didn't get past the third day. This time it was a case of having a very vague idea of a story, one not fully formed in my head enough to keep up my momentum. Then last year, 2013, I had an awesome idea for TWO sequels to Thanks, That Was Fun. My 2013 NaNoWriMo plan was to start on In Spite of Me, the second installment of my would-be trilogy. (The Morphine album Cure For Pain was the inspiration, hence the book title.). But that fell apart about 16,000 words in. I don't quite know what happened there, but I still have all my outlines and I will definitely return to ISoM in the future.

And then, this year. This year! Fourth time was the charm. I wrote my ass off for 30 days and ended up with 50,107 words. The novel is nowhere near finished. In fact, it's only 3/4 of the way there, and much editing needs to be done. But still, I DID IT!

My 2014 NaNoWriMo novel is, incidentally, titled Harleighwood. I'm giving myself a week off before I go back and start editing and adding to fully complete it.

But for now, YES! It is finished. Temporarily.

2 comments:

Ms Sparrow said...

Woohoo! Good for you. I did the NaNoWriMo in 2011 but just to prove to myself I could do it. I actually was able to write a conclusion to Jane's journey but in the process, I sorta lost my mojo. I took a novel-writing class from Judith Guest years ago and I remember her saying "You want to start and finish a novel while you're the same person". I think that might be the problem.





andiepants said...

That's awesome! Do you still have the manuscript? It might be worthwhile to see if you could work with pieces of it....maybe a short story or novella?