Doing NaNoWriMo? I Made Something For You

Well, I made something for us.

In November, write the novel you’ve always wanted to read.

Because I’ve heard it’s tough to get through 30 days and nights of literary abandon solo.

Not familiar with NaNoWriMo? It’s short for National Writing Month. It’s an international non-profit that gathers 100,000-some aspiring and accomplished novelists yearly in a 50,000-word novel-writing challenge. With a time limit: 30 days, specifically from midnight November 1st to midnight December 1st. Pre-writing is allowed but pre-drafting scenes and chapters are not. {In other words, you’re not supposed to start the challenge with any of your first draft written.}

I’m doing my first NaNo this year in conjunction with four friends from my old college writing group: Brian, Caryn, Amanda, and Phil. We’ll be checking in with each other via Skype video chat over the four weeks, keeping each other accountable and, we hope, in good humor.

Are you doing NaNoWriMo 2010?

If so, you can join with me in spirit three ways:

1.} Download this Guide I created to help us get ready in October to rock our NaNoWriMo’s in November. It’s free.

This is the thing I made that I alluded to in the title. It’s called The Choose-Your-Method Guide To Rocking Your NaNoWriMo. I created this especially for me and my virtual writing group friends {hence the references to Brian Chaffee}, but I got so inspired half way through that I thought to share it with our fellow NaNo-ers everywhere. It gives you a loose October pre-planning/pre-writing schedule that you can adapt to suit your writing style. No rules, no pressure.

2.} @Reply me on Twitter to be added to the #NaNoLove Twitter community. Put #NaNoLove in your Tweet.

#NaNoLove is a Twitter hashtag community dreamed up by me and Eleanor Wragg, a copywriter/world-traveling journalist and another NaNo first timer. We’ll be Tweeting multiple times a day from now through November regarding all things NaNoWriMo: the process, the pain, the plot, the pleasure, the protagonist, you get it. Word is that in November, Eleanor will be updating her blog daily-ish/nightly-ish with anecdotal stories about her work-in-progress. {You can follow the lovely Eleanor on Twitter @EleanorWragg.}

You can follow the #NaNoLove list by clicking Follow This List, but your Tweets won’t appear in the Tweetstream for the list unless you @reply me to be added to the list.

3.} During the month of November — and maybe before; we shall see — you can eavesdrop on my NaNoWriMo experience.

Here I go getting all meta again. [grin and eye roll]

Each day, I’ll be recording a mini, 3- to 5-minute audio for my blog that shares something I learned from the day’s writing. Just naked audio, no frills. I want these audios to feel quiet, intimate, and inspirational, not the least bit coach-y or didactic. They’ll be short enough that you can listen to them while you check your email. Great for writing types who miss talking with other writers about their work.

So that’s all for now. In case you haven’t already, go ahead and download your free Choose-Your-Method Guide To Rocking Your NaNoWriMo using the big juicy link below.

Download your Guide here.

P.S. If you should happen to find any typos, errors, or broken links in the Guide, please feel free to let me know and they’ll be corrected straightaway. Thanks and enjoy!