Nanowrimo!

How many of you know what Nanowrimo is? Would it make a difference if I mentioned that it starts today?

Nanowrimo is National Novel Writing Month, celebrated in November by crazies like me who think in all our spare time that we can write 50k words by November 30^th. Why do we do this?

1. Deadlines, Deadlines, Deadlines

How many people have you met who lounge around coffee shops with a copy of Tolstoy or Chekov or Austen and say, “Yeah, I’m a writer.” It’s easy to say you’re a writer, but what are you actually writing? And what keeps you from putting your feet up at the coffee house instead of putting your pen to the paper?

Deadlines, dearie. This is why successful writers don’t quit their day job –unless their name is Stephen King or Jhumpa Lahiri and discipline is their super power. I mean, as romantic as it sounds to only be a writer and to have no other job, and to sit in a room in your house with your laptop, pajamas, and cup of coffee, real writers have multiple jobs. Real writers have lives. Real writers make writing work because they only have an hour or two a day (if they’re lucky) to squeeze in writing. Real writers have discipline and get stuff written because the yahoo in her pajamas is still dreaming and saying she’s trying to find a good place to start.

Nanowrimo gets you to start –pajamas or not. Nanowrimo is about beginnings.

2. It’s Fun –Even If You Don’t Win

Nanowrimos strive to write 50k words, but not everyone does. Truthfully, it is a lot of pressure to put on yourself. But here’s the best part: there’s no risk. You don’t pay to play. You don’t lose anything. You set a goal, you either accomplished it or not. Some writers will even join Nanowrimo with the goal of writing only 10k words, and if they get to 50k, great. Why play like this? Because it gets you to write. Just write. Just do it. No one is going to write your novel if you don’t.

Here’s another fun tool: the website is full of stats that keep you going. Not only do you have a team of cheerleaders pumping you up for the game, but you have a website with a profile specifically dedicated to you so that you can track your progress. If this isn’t the way to write a novel (in a month), I don’t know what is.

3. Community

With forums and write-ins and support groups (in the non-substance-abuse sense), you know you’re not alone. It’s not one of those empty phrases thrown out there –you’re really not alone. Currently, there are almost 200,000 writers signed up (198,599 to be exact) and these people are writing on forums, blogging about their writing, and using social media to talk about their writing. Writers need a community to be successful, and this is your community.

4. Success

If you win, you have 50k words to show for it. Does that mean you’re ready to publish on December 1^st? Hell, no. But, to steal a metaphor from John Green, you’ve pulled the mud out of the ground to sculpt into clay. To steal another metaphor from John Green, you’ve cut down the tree and now you’re ready to carve the chair. Writing 50k words is about writing a crappy first draft –something that you can mold into something amazing.

Did you know that Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern was a Nanowrimo? This is just one of hundreds of published books from Nanowrimo. Does this mean you’ll publish? No. (Stop obsessing about publishing.) This just means you’re one step closer.

It starts today, my friends. Your novel, that is -it starts today. 

Sign up at www.nanowrimo.org.