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NaNoWriMo 2020

Participating in National Novel Writing Month this year for me started out well, took a nasty dive and then may have actually cured a lingering malaise I've been having with writing productivity in 2020. It didn't help that I lost my two pups just before and in the first week of NaNo, and I did consider giving up and waving the white flag. Very glad I didn't.

My wordcount as of the writing of this post (10:45 pm on 11/29) was 71,635. I'm going to try to hit 75K tomorrow, but even if I don't, I'm very happy with how much I wrote.

What I did differently this go-round: I joined a writing group on the Nano web site, which was low-key friendly but stayed pretty quiet for the most part. Some nice girls in the bunch, but they didn't talk much. I'm hoping I wasn't the reason for that; I tried to stay low-key friendly, too.

Although I wasn't really inspired to participate in the forums after running into some pinheads last year, I did that, too, and got to help out one writer with a character citizenship issue that she couldn't find an answer to. By random chance I happen to know the rather obscure info she needed. She was delighted and said I'm her new hero now, which was a nice pat on the back.

The writing: Due to my ass dragging with a project for work I had to switch novels at the last minute. Instead of writing Gemini, the book I was going to do for fun, I finished up a starter novel for a new series my partner and I are doing next year. I felt a little resentful about that, but the job must come first.

How it went: such a rollercoaster.

The first part of the month started okay; at one point I was 3k ahead. After we lost Skye I just could not get the words on the page. I still sat down every day and hammered away at it, mostly because I am stubborn, and hauled out from my brain what I could. There was one day when I wrote only 96 words, so I really didn't expect to finish. Then something amazing happened. On the 17th inspiration hit me like a sledgehammer, and smashed open my creative flood gates. All the crap that has been weighing me down simply evaporated. I wrote over 10k in a single day.

I haven't done that in many, many years. I kept writing at that flood speed too, and hit the 50K mark on 11/22. Then I just figured I'd keep going and see how much I could crank out in a month. This isn't a lot of lousy first draft writing, either. It's some of the best writing I've done in years. I'm probably going to be able to do one big final edit and be done with it.

Physically it was a bit harder to slog through the long hours required to write this much, and I've probably spent more time in a cervical collar this month than I have all year due to my neck issues. Don't care. Totally worth it.

Will I able to do it in 2021? I damn well will try to. This year really helped me a lot, writing-wise. Plus I love it. I just love it.:)

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nightsmusic said…
Congrats on finishing! I probably hit 40K total but kept taking everything out and rewriting it (though I saved it!) and then got caught up with getting everything ready for last Thursday. Add to that, I've now gone through four laptops and am keeping this one. Period. But I can tell you None of them are made like they used to be.

I'm hitting the last three of your posts here so...

I loved that book! It was fascinating to read through and I still go back to it.
We had Things 1 & 2 and their husbands over for dinner Thursday as well as father and sister in law. It was nice. Jimmy's working so even though they take precautions when he enters his building, and I'm still going to the grocery so...
I think you need to give yourself a pass for Christmas, yes. It won't be perfect, mine never is. You do what you can and what makes you happy and that's okay. And get another puppy when one tugs at your heart, not because there's a time limit.
I'm really glad you found your writing mojo again. This year has been very hard for me for some reason (gee?) and my imagination is so, so slow.

So, Happy Belated Thanksgiving...I'm still here. Somewhere ;)

And that spider web is the bomb!
December 1, 2020 at 3:50 AM
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