So did all you WriMos out there get Chris Baty's latest email? They are now accepting stories about how NaNoWriMo has impacted your life for the good or the bad. They want to know all the crazy details in a short 100 to 1000 word essay to be published on the NaNoBlog.
How has NaNoWriMo changed my life? I have met a few wonderful people that have become good friends and companions. People who I would not have met otherwise. My Co-ML LaMishia and I chat pretty much daily through email about writing, photography, the quest for men, books and so much more. She is awesome! Our writing styles are very different and yet we compliment each other so well. We are constantly helping each other out and talking our way through writer's block and dead plots. Although it is difficult to get together due to our schedules and commitments we make sure to meet up at least once a month to write. I am truly blessed to have her in my life right now.
Then there is Stacey. We are completely different and and yet so strangely similar. She is a true hippie and me, well I have no idea what I am. But through our conversations over the past eight months we have discovered some similarities that have given us a lot to talk about. We both grew up in Portland, Oregon. We frequented the same pubs and hangouts. We both made the move East to Virginia at roughly the same time. We both remodeled our kitchens recently. Not so strange you say? Well let's see. We both started the projects before we met and neither one of us are finished. We both decided to do the work ourselves rather than hire someone. (We would rather spend the money on books.) We chose the same cabinets. Not similar. The same. Identical. Sink? Same! Stainless steel appliances, huge islands, hardwood floors and oh don't forget the plywood counters we lived with for over a year because we couldn't make up our minds about we wanted. I finally settled on butcher block. Can you guess what she she is getting? So today I find out that she is on the verge of purchasing an existing bookshop not far from where we live. I myself have been considering the purchase of a local bookshop for the past year. Strange huh? I can't help but think that perhaps all these similarities have been building up for a reason and that reason has just been revealed. Maybe we were meant to go into business together. Rather than two struggling bookshops we should pool our efforts into one struggling bookshop?
Then of course there is W.E.E. Ghosties. A fun little venture that started with a writing challenge. The Shenandoah Valley 2007 NaNoWriMo challenge was created when a small group of us discovered that we all shared a common interest...ghosts. So at one our write-ins we decided that each of us had to incorporate a ghost into our novel. Seattle has their duck so we thought hey we can have a ghost. It was an easy challenge for Stacey as she was actually writing a ghost story. I was experimenting with magical realism so it was an easy leap. Emily's main characters were a stripper, a fireman and two fencers so with that combination she was fairly confident she could throw in a ghost and no one would be surprised. LaMishia, on the other hand, writes erotica. But even she was up for the challenge. So where was I? Oh yes, W.E.E. Ghosties. We had a lot of conversations about our own "paranormal" experiences and ghost hunting groups and such and eventually we decided we wanted to go on a ghost hunt together. Stacey was our experienced ghost hunter having been involved with ghost hunting and the paranormal for years. She's rubbed shoulders with the best of them but I am not going to do any name dropping here. Anyway, we scheduled our first ghost hunt at West Virginia Penitentiary and during the month of planning for our investigation Stacey's existing Wee Ghosties blog evolved into Winchester Entity Experts or W.E.E. Ghosties. We have conducted several investigations that have produced some interesting results. We have an exciting three day hunt scheduled a week from now in Virginia Beach. We even have business cards and T-shirts! (You know the black ones with the big white block letters!) Pretty cool huh?
So that is how NaNoWriMo has changed my life. Oh yeah and I have written two novels. So that's a plus! How has NaNoWriMo changed your life? Tell us all about it.
Take care WriMos. I can't wait for November!
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2006: The Scrapbook - I did it!
2007: Leaving Lucy (working title) - Success!
2008: Undecided, but it might start something like...He was a dark and stormy knight....
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Jul 5, 2008 - 17 25
Somewhere back in ages past, that puts it in the range of 1999 thru 2003, I found out about NaNoWriMo and started outlining The Great American Urban Fantasy. Finally, in 2006 I was able to get a laptop computer, convince my wife to let me write, register for NaNoWriMo, and pull off the writing of a 51,000 word novel about a twenty-something young lady surviving in the inner city after the apartment building in which she lived burned to the ground.
I discovered that I had only used up about half of the outline that I had been working on. However, I felt so good about the resulting novel that I started doing the formatting type of stuff necessary to get something that looked like a "Real Book" that could be published through the Lulu.com web site. It took me about nine months to learn enough about my word processor to be able to do things right.
Add to that about another six months of letting a friend try his hand at custom cover art before I opted for free cover art from the Lulu.com web site, and it took me about a year and a half to actually publish a book entitled " The Vision of Second Samuel ". It is now available on Amazon.com, other sites world wide, and can be special ordered at your local Barnes & Noble. It only cost me $100 for the ISBN that gets me listed in the international list of books currently in print. The rest of the costs are all covered in the cover price of the book ($16.50), and I get royalties for it..
In November of 2007 I wrote the sequel to that first book. It was my second novel entitled " Second Samuel's Vision Revealed ". It only took me about six months to have the second book ready to go. I released it on 20 June, 2008. It will be available on Amazon.com and at Barnes & Noble by the end of August.
I am now a published author with over $20 of royalties under my belt. I am not just looking to write and publish a novel each year by participating in NaNoWriMo, I am, as well, working at publishing at least seven books of poetry as a result of having been composing poems since 1969. While I have a life outside of writing, it is becoming clear that a major portion of my life is wrapped up in being a wordsmith. I am now transitioning from being a computer geek to being a professional author. All because of NaNoWriMo.
How does one say thanks to those who have given him a destiny he will enjoy fulfilling?
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Jul 13, 2008 - 18 17
Hi Suzieiz, and thanks for sharing the story. I'm new to NaNoWriMo, and hoping it will likewise spark all kinds exciting changes and adventures (internal and external) to keep my creativity renewal and development in progress.