NEWS: Ladies and Gentlemen, Ready Your Pens: It's National Novel Writing Month

GEEK: Ladies and Gentlemen, Ready Your Pens: It's National Novel Writing Month

Good morning, kids! It is now November First. I hope you didn't all party too hard last night and make yourselves sick from candy (or liquor), because -- should you choose to accept it -- quite a daunting task lays just ahead of you. Today is the first day of National Novel Writing Month, and you know as well as I do that that blinking cursor at the start of that blank white word document isn't just going to move itself along the screen.

What, exactly, is National Novel Writing Month? I'm so glad you asked. It was founded by Chris Baty up in the Bay Area back in 1999, just him and 20 friends and a pact to write in a frenzied mass.

Hey, those are pretty great reasons for writing novels, if you ask me. Anyway, the fun project grew, spawning a guidebook and becoming something of a movement. Last year saw over seventy-nine thousand registered participants, thirteen thousand of which crossed the proverbial finish line by the stated goal.

It's also, since its inception, grown into something bigger than itself, reaching out via the power of the interwebs to become a national (or international, really) rallying cry. At its most basic, it can be seen as a catalyst, adding the sort of motivation often lacking when given such a formidable open-ended task.

Perhaps even more importantly, it's a world of anonymous support, acknowledging -- and thereby hopefully banishing -- the "oh god, it's not really that great yet" train of thought, one of the biggest roadblocks to approaching a novel. The staff of Writing Month know that such a feat written in a month isn't going to be automatically publishable. (Unless you happen to be the Second Coming of Jack Kerouac. And even then that's up for debate. And if you are, drop me a line, will you?) Immediate full-on brilliance isn't the point here -- that's what editors are for. It's getting it done in the first place that matters most. All you need is a draft.

If nothing else, however, it's a fun and ambitious thing to do this month, in case you get bored just sitting around and waiting for turkey and pie (or tofu and pie, whichever). I'm not going to lie and say it's not that much to write -- I just went back and did a word-count on my "perpetual novel in progress," also known as the novella I wrote in my most successful college writing course ever. Eight thousand. Crap. Still -- check out the site, peruse the rules, and see if it interests you. Who knows: today could be the first day of the rest of your life as a writer.



_DictionaryGirl_ really ought to get around to finishing that novel...

I wrote a novella once. And no, you cannot read it. but I wrote it. It's done. And it sits in my closet like the crap it is. But I wrote it.

I also recently received a fortune cookie that told me I was going to become an accomplished writer. WTF kind of fortune is that?

I began about an hour ago

once upon a time, in a land far far away....... shit thats it. i'm out of ideas.

This will be my third attempt. The first reached 27k, the second flopped completely.

It's 4pm and I haven't started yet. Doesn't leave much time for the requisite 1667 words a day.

I totally read that as

'Ready your Penis'

Kerouac is overrated.

I suppose I should get started...

I'd be so down for this if I had more time. Typing one handed while breastfeeding is hard as fuck, yo.

I just started outside of email I don't think I have written anything in the 12 year since I left school

congrats. maybe you should write childrens books. its the new celebrity thing right. ricky gervais, madonna, duchess of york. easy. all ya need is a spare 10 minutes when baby isn't awake.

me too!!!!!

I wrote it off.

At least I wasn't the only one.

This gets my creative juices flowing. Perhaps I can write a modern masterpiece about a toaster... or a clock. Like Brian Regan, I want a slice of that financial pie.




Link to MySpace

hahahhahahah!

I better get started.

Let's use this page as a forum of support for the people who -are- gonna do it - keep posting how many words you've written, and we can maybe keep each other going.....

5 pages a day? yowza.

+1

That's nothing. I can write 5 pages in an hour. And do, regularly, right before class.

Dalton Trumbo (my personal hero) used to be able to churn out entire screenplays in about two weeks. Try that on for size.

I am certainly not Dalton Trumbo. I got 800 words in and did a little dance because it's a pretty big accomplishment for me.

Hey!

I'm a pro with that, Now I have 4 unfinished stories to finish and that is my biggest goal.

It's time to rock!

My eye inserted an i as well.

I think I might have to do this ......

PS: 5 pages a day? that's nothing. I, too, am well-versed in the spastic writing frenzy that is "oh shit my paper is due in two hours". Unfortunately, I still AM in college and still HAVE papers to write for that.. which might slow down this process a tad. hmm.

(for the record, though, my greatest accomplishment as a procrastinator was 15 pages in 3 hours. but I don't think it would be healthy to spend the entire month of November hopped on caffeine pills and coffee... )

I'm already kicking ass!

I think the title of my book will be 'Typing One Handed While Breastfeeding is Hard as Fuck, Yo'

It can be about a woman torn between her love of a porn site and her newborn.