Hey all - two more days to push through! Remember, while 50K is a good goal, at the end of the month, whatever you have written will probably be more than you would have written without NaNoWriMo. At least, that's true for me.
For those NaNo veterans, what tips can you give for those of us that still have wordcount or novel to go?
I found yesterday that I'm summarizing more than I did in the beginning, just to get to the end of the story by December 1. I figure I can go back and flesh out some those parts later.
Oh yeah and:
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2007: Her Favorite Wine
2006: Variables
"Writing is one act of boldness after another." - Sue Monk Kidd
50,018 / 50,000
Nov 29, 2007 - 07 23
Tips?
Don't die
Don't quit
If your at 40k or above you can still do this. Steal writing times in small chunks throughout the day to supplement your normal writing time...write during lunch break, and 15 minute breaks at work. Steal 15 minutes with your morning coffee - that good for 300 words for me and probably 600 words for everyone else :). Go to the write-in tonight, get in a couple of thousand words there...then go home and write. Just write.
And then when you reach 50k get drunk.
You'll probably feel drunk anyway, so maybe you won't need the booze.
On a more serious note,
----------Don't quit
and
Don't die.
A question in your nerves is lit
Yet you know there is no answer fit to satisfy
Insure you not to quit
To keep it in your mind and not fergit
That it is not he or she or them or it
That you belong to.
--It's Alright Ma (I'm Only Bleeding), Bob Dylan
5,790 / 50,000
Nov 29, 2007 - 09 39
If you have haven't reached the end just yet - a lot of folks go for filler right now to reach the end - and like you said - you can always edit it out and make it what it should be anyway. Me personally I've only met the goal once and that was last year and that was two weeks after the end of NaNo - because I had a couple of weeks where I didn't write at all and then something came to me and I decided I could write the story so I set my goal for the 50,000 words by the middle of December and it worked for me, I did end up with about 56,000 words - but now to think about editing it and making it stronger - and adding more paranormal elements in it to get it placed with a new publisher -
For now, I'm just working on small goals and not worried about how many words I really get in. I have fun supporting you all and making sure you have a warring buddy if needed or just a person who is there - for whatever reason you need me. i know I could help our group tremendously if I did write but I don't feel compelled to do a novel really since I have written the one I had and I feel that short stories are my calling. I'm going to work on some more states later today and hope to have at least 6 more done by the end of day tomorrow (I can do roughly one story in an hour as long as the ideas are there and the story isn't lack excitement for me and right now the stories have a high excitement level for me but more on that later - so who knows with the one I've got done and hoping to do at least 3 more today and 3 tomorrow, maybe more if work doesn't start picking up, I may end up well over the 10,000 word limit by the end of this whole thing - lol --- and you hve to read my info in my excerpt to understand about my word counts - E :)
----------Elysabeth Eldering
author of THE TULIP KISS and BUTTERFLY HALVES
BRIDE-AND-SEEK, a short story selected to appear in The Petigru Review (available now on amazon.com)
http://elysabethsstories.blogspot.com/
www.emesemporium.net
51,028 / 50,000
Nov 29, 2007 - 12 07
Since I focused on the scenes in the novel that were clearest in my mind, I'm going back now and laying ground work and writing the bridges to those scenic islands. Since it's fanfic, my novel won't need as much polishing as other people's would, though for once I'd like to get the whole thing done before beginning to post it online. I am sort of waiting on my science advisor (she can only contact me on weekends as she's a middle school teacher) to put a few touches in and make a few decisions (such as, how to kill off one of the canon characters!).
I did take a break when I finally hit 50K, and did some much needed housework, but now I've got to get back to it before my muse, that "fickle little strumpet" decides to take a vacation.
Just keep writing. Keep yourself in the story.
----------Save the Earth! It's the only planet with chocolate!
58,968 / 50,000
Nov 30, 2007 - 09 46
Some ideas if you just need writing fodder:
Ninjas!
Zombies who enjoy grits (although I think this has been done)
Dream sequence
Diary entries
Car trips
Weather
Ghosts
Holidays
Meals
Shopping
Childhood memory
Personally, today I have to write a stalker in the snowed in cabin scene.... saved the best for last!
----------2007: Her Favorite Wine
2006: Variables
"Writing is one act of boldness after another." - Sue Monk Kidd
52,431 / 50,000
Nov 30, 2007 - 12 20
I had a scene last year where my MC's neice wanted to be a zombie for halloween, and take her aunt's pomeranian as her zombie dog. It was only a couple hundred words. Not enough to make or break me.
Caitie Jo
----------2007 - The Smallest Downfall of All - The one thing that made us so great will be the one thing that destroys us
...it's a love story; it always is...
58,968 / 50,000
Nov 30, 2007 - 17 14
I made it to the end!! Woot woot, see y'all tomorrow.
----------2007: Her Favorite Wine
2006: Variables
"Writing is one act of boldness after another." - Sue Monk Kidd
52,431 / 50,000
Nov 30, 2007 - 21 09
Yay! I still haven't made it to the end of mine. My villain still has something nasty things he has to do. And then he has to be removed from power...
Sadly, I won't be there tomorrow. Sigh. I'm there in spirit...
Caitie Jo
----------2007 - The Smallest Downfall of All - The one thing that made us so great will be the one thing that destroys us
...it's a love story; it always is...