NaNoWriMo

NaNoWriMo. No, that is not a greeting used by Mork, nor is it some new medical condition. It stands for NAtional NOvel WRiting MOnth. Every year during the month of November people all over the world sit down and attempt to write a novel of 50,000 words or more in 30 days. Not a novella, not a short story, a full-length novel. This is the 10th year for this exercise in unabashed writing, and thousands "win" the event every year by reaching that goal.

You may recall from my recent post 40220 that I completed the novella I had been working on for the last 4 years. I was ready for another project, and as I was mulling what to do next I was reminded about NaNoWriMo. The timing is perfect, the stars are aligned, and my plate is cleared.

I will be participating in NaNoWriMo this year with a new idea that is totally unrelated to anything I've worked on before. I will be writing a novel, with a minimum length of 50,000 words, in the next 30 days.

What this means is that I will probably be a little quieter on-line than normal. You'll see me less on Twitter, Facebook, and e-mail as I feverishly pound out at least 1,667 words a day to reach the goal.

There are ways you can keep up with my efforts. I have added a widget on the website for this blog that will show my daily recorded word count. You can visit my NaNoWriMo profile page, where you can not only see my word count but also a synopsis of my novel's plot and eventually an excerpt from it as well. If you are one of my Facebook friends you will auto-magically see my word counts as I put them on the NaNoWriMo site, and I will also post my counts daily on Twitter. At major milestones I will also post updates on this blog.

NaNoWriMo officially starts at midnight tonight, and I will be up to get a jump start on my novel. Wish me luck, pray for me, and follow my progress. The fact that I've told all of you about this will be one of my major motivations to see this through to completion.

For me midnight will not be the witching hour, it will be the writing hour, and I can't wait until I can sit down and start getting this novel out of my head. For when I can say "Let us begin" and start typing.