My NaNoWriMo Strategy

A few nights ago, I was doing some calculations on my current writing schedule as it pertained to the National Novel Writers Month competition. At the time, I had written about 8900 words. I started doing some math, which is something that computer-geeks like me do all of the time.

I figured I had to write approximately 2100 words per day six days a week in order to get to the targeted 50,000. Wow, that is a lot more than the 1667 words per day I was targeting at the beginning of the competition.

My writing was going well; I was having no problem actually churning out a few pages when I sat down. But, I was getting to the point where the story in my head was getting more difficult to connect to where I was in the book. I had written nine chapters thus far, and was only scratching the surface.
So I decided to spend a night plotting out the rest of my book rather than actually writing a complete chapter.

I started at chapter 10, and wrote a little blurb about what I wanted that chapter to be about. I put it in brackets ([]) so I would not get confused later. When I finished that blurb, which was nothing more than a paragraph summarizing what I wanted to tell about next, I inserted a page break and did the same for chapter 11.

Fifty-nine chapters later, and I had the pleasure of writing, “The End.” Of course, what I really have right now is just a skeleton, but I think it is a GOOD skeleton. By thinking through each chapter one by one, I was able to direct the story towards what I had originally conceived, but without the pressure of making all the little details interesting. I now have a blueprint for success in the competition.

Sure, the book may still suck. But it will be 50,000 words of suck, which is really the point, now isn’t it?

Long story longer: I sat down today and wrote chapters 10 and 11 in one sitting. It took me about an hour and fifteen minutes, and I churned out more than 2100 words. The other night when I did my planning added over 2000 words of summary text, so I was already at 10,900 before the day began. I am now sitting at 13,175, and couldn’t feel more confident that I was going to get it done.

Wish me luck! I may post some of my glorious prose at some point when I feel the need to be held in an entirely new, if not unflattering, light in my circle of influence. Thankfully, no one I know actually reads this blog, so I might be safe sharing my secrets with you.

Tags: fiction, nanowrimo, writing