What I Do in the In-Between Months

Although November is not an even-numbered month, and I’m not planning to do an official art or music project this month, I decided to record my progress on NaNoWriMo here because it is a 30-day project, after all. Usually, during odd months I focus on various writing projects for my blog, or copywriting, writing coaching, and all the other fun stuff that comes with running a business (www.beabrilliantwriter.com).

This Year’s NaNo Project

I have an original story idea  from a vivid dream I had many years ago. Basic plot: Mu, an introverted Japanese-African-American teen stumbles across Missy, a friendly but lonely classmate with a severe physical handicap. As they become friends, they navigate the maze of growing up “different,” together. A coming-of-age story.

The goal is to write 3,000 words per day, minimum. Ceiling will probably be 3500. Let’s see how it goes!

Prep

In September, I bullet-point-brainstormed the story. I could story-card it, but chose not to at the moment. Other things a bit more pressing. We’ll see how it goes!

Week 1 (11/1-11/9)

Business: Wrote around 3K per day. The goal I set for myself is to his multiples of 3K per day. So day 1 = 3K+, day 2 = 6K+, etc. If I go a little over, then I have less to do to reach the next 3K mark.

Thoughts: I’m not in love with my writing. This is more an exercise in self-discipline. I’ve been using a Pomodoro technique to get through. 20 min of nothing but writing, alternating with 10 min of YouTube time. It takes about 4 sessions (1.5 hours) to reach my daily word count goal.

Week 2 (11/10-11/16)

Week 3 (11/17-11/23)

Week 4 (11/24-11/30)

Update 2/7/20

It’s been a while since I’ve returned to this site. A quick update on the project. About halfway through I realized I didn’t do enough plotting. (I’m a plantser. Half plotter, half pantser) and that the characters were not turning out the way I’d hoped at all. So I confess I quit for several weeks.

But I promised myself that I would at least FINISH the word count, which I did accomplish on 1/31/20. Honestly, it was like pulling teeth. I had to play all kinds of games, use timers, tally marks and checks to just get through it. In the end, I resorted to simply “telling myself the story” and not exactly writing it AS a story.

At least I finished it.

But next time I do this, I need to do much more in-depth planning, for sure!