Transitioning from the high-speed, deadline-driven mayhem of NaNoWriMo back into the real world can be a little disconcerting. Unwashed dishes are towering in the sink, loved ones are confused at our presence, and we suddenly have to measure achievement in something other than 1667-word increments.
It all adds up to a sudden loss of focus, and its easy to feel uncomfortably aimless and a little down in the dumps. Veteran participants call it the post-NaNo blues, and it tends to last anywhere from a couple days to eleven months, depending on what sort of November you had. As tempting as it is to try and keep the blues at bay by tackling another huge writing project right away, what your body and brain really need at this point is rest. Or some manic holiday shopping. Whichever comes first.
To get the writerly ball rolling again after your mojo recharges, we've also added the December and Beyond forums to the site, dedicated exclusively to life after NaNo.
Next up on the Office of Letters and Light's rollercoaster of creative adventures: Script Frenzy, where we write a 100-page screenplay or stage play in the month of April. You can even collaborate with a partner! All of us on staff jumped into the Frenzy last year and it was a complete blast. Bonus: You can use your NaNo username and password to log in to the Script Frenzy site. Things will be pretty mellow in Frenzyland until March 1, when we'll launch a month of prep before our scriptwriting adventures begin.
There are also heaps of events run by other people to provide some structure and community for your post-NaNo endeavors. We're not affiliated with any of these (except Script Frenzy), but as far as we know, all of these events are free and open to everyone. If you know of any other sites or events we should be posting here, drop us a line!
NaNoWriMo-style Events On the Horizon
Script Frenzy - NaNoWriMo's sister challenge (April). Goal: Write a 100-page screenplay or stage play in April.
NaNoFiMo.org - National Novel Finishing Month (December). Goal: 30,000 words.
JaNoWriMo - January Novel Writing Month (January). Goal: 50,000 words, or whatever goal you set.
FAWM - February Album Writing Month (February). Goal: Write 14 original songs in a month.
NaNoEdMo - National Novel Editing Month (March). Goal: Commit to 50 hours of novel editing.
JulNoWriMo - July Novel Writing Month (July). Goal: 50,000 words for a new or unfinished manuscript.
24 Hour Comics Day - (Changes annually, lasts 24 hours). Goal: Draw a 24-page comic in one 24-hour period.
48 Hour Film Project - (Varies; operates via tours around the USA, lasts 48 hours). Goal: Create a short film in 48 hours.
Book in a Week - (Begins on the Monday of the first full week of each month, lasts one week). Goal: Write a novel.
Mad Challenge - (Varies). Goal: Complete a variety of point challenges issued by moderators, including writing 10,000 in 5 hours.
April Fool's - (April). Goal: Set a word-count goal for yourself and fulfill it by the end of the month.
3-Day Novel Contest - (August 30-September 1). Goal: Write a novel in three days.
NaPlWriMo - National Playwriting Month (November). Goal: Write a play in one month.
NaNoMangO - The artist's alternative to NaNoWriMo (November). Goal: Draw 30 pages of sequential art in one month.
AugNoWriMo - August Novel Writing Month (August). Goal: Write a novel in one month.
NaNoPubYe - National Novel Publishing Year (Year-Round). Goal: Get that NaNoWriMo novel ready for publication!
Free Copy of Your Winning NaNoWriMo Manuscript in Book Form
We wish we could report that some brave company once again boldly stepped forward to offer every NaNo winner a free copy of their manuscript in book form. We poked and prodded, but couldn't make it happen this year. We're not giving up for next year, though!
Some Thoughts on Publishing
And speaking of book forms, a growing number of NaNoWriMo authors have sold their November novels to publishers. We love this, and have a collection of NaNoWriMo books that have been purchased by publishing houses in a place of honor in the NaNo office.
Publication is a great goal, no doubt about it. But we'd be remiss if we didn't also point out that there are quite a few people and companies who make their living taking advantage of inexperienced novelists. If you're setting out to find an agent or publisher for your NaNo-novel, please familiarize yourself with some of the traps and pitfalls that you might encounter along the way. Cybele has laid out a handy reference guide in the December and Beyond forum: http://www.nanowrimo.org/eng/node/1072366
Tips on Rewriting
Ah, rewriting. It hurts so bad, but it helps so much. If your book was born in November, it's going to take many, many months (if not years) of revision before it's ready for the bookstore shelves. That's the bad news. The good news is that novel rewriting is even more rewarding than novel writing. Whether you end up self-publishing or getting an agent and selling the book to someone else's press, there's nothing more satisfying than taking your manuscript as far as it will go.
We asked several novelists who have moved their NaNoWriMo novels along the path from rough draft to book contract to answer the following question: "What's the best thing and the worst thing you can do when trying to rewrite a NaNoWriMo novel?"
Here's what they said:
First, Lani Diane Rich. Lani is the award-winning author of five novels (two of which started out as NaNoWriMo manuscripts). Recent Lani novels include The Fortune Quilt
The best thing you can do while rewriting a Nano novel is to find out why you wrote your story in the first place. Not why you did Nano—that’s a no-brainer—but why you took Nano and wrote that story with it. During the Nano experience—or any rough draft experience—things are heady and wild and totally out of control. Everything’s fun, even the painful parts, and nothing’s off the table. But once things get serious, and you’ve decided to pursue your story further, the real work comes in. That’s when you need to ask yourself, “Why this story?” It can be overwhelming. But if you can figure out why you had to write that story, then you've got the key to the kingdom. It’ll give you a roadmap for what to prune, what to buff up, and what to cut altogether. And don't judge yourself if you're not sure at first what your story is about - a lot of us have no idea what we're getting at until the rough draft is done. Just sit and ponder on it for a while before you get back into the manuscript.
How will you know when you’ve hit on the reason why you had to tell that story? You'll have a sudden urge to drop everything you're doing and start hacking away at your manuscript. So maybe don’t operate heavy machinery while you’re in the pondering stage. Just a little handy little tip from me to you.
The worst thing you can do? Worry about how bad it sucks. The thing with Nano is that you're going for quantity, not quality. But once you start revising, you have to be concerned with quality. So, you read your Nano manuscript over again, and you find some areas—like the 1700 words you wrote on Thanksgiving in between nutmeg and Aunt Millie’s 80-proof nog—are seriously lacking with regard to quality.
It is at this time that you must remember the cardinal rule of writing: Every rough draft sucks. I’m not exaggerating. Think of your favorite book. Think of its brilliance, how it spoke to you, how it changed your life and made you a better person. Got it in your head? Yeah? Well, the rough of that very book sucked. It sucked hard. Trust me on this. All published authors, even the really good ones, are in the business of taking crappy rough drafts and forming them into something worth reading. So, if your rough draft sucks—and it will because they all do, see above re: universal law—just remember that you are absolutely on track for this part of the process. Also remember that worrying too much about how bad you suck knocks you out of balance, and then you can’t see where you didn’t suck, which is a problem because that’s the stuff you want to keep.
Writing—and especially revising—is not for wimps. Cowboy up, develop a balanced appreciation for your strengths and your weaknesses, and know your theme; those are the best revising tools a writer can have. Good luck!
Next up, Gayle Brandeis. Gayle is the author of Fruitflesh: Seeds of Inspiration for Women Who Write
The best thing you can do before revising a NaNo novel is give yourself a well deserved break. You worked fast and furious for 30 days; give yourself and your novel some time to cool off. It's only when you have some distance from your story that you'll be able to see it clearly enough to hunker down into the serious work of editing. It may be hard to see anything clearly for a while after being in such a word-drunk daze of a month. Take some time to let your eyes stop spinning in your head, to let the scenes stop unfurling in your mind, to let the dream of the novel settle back into its subconscious cave before you face the reality of the words on the page.
When you're ready to start revising, be kind with yourself but brutal with your work. Don't beat yourself up about the state of the novel—it's supposed to be rough at this stage. Now is the time when you can make it shine. Slash every word, every sentence, every scene that doesn't nourish the story, that doesn't either move the story forward or illuminate the characters in some important way. You may want to break the novel down into an outline (even if you wrote an outline to start with, this outline will be different; this is an outline of what is, not what could be)—when you boil each scene down to a sentence or so, it can help you see where the holes are in the story, where the narrative gets bogged down with too much description and not enough action, where you may have left unanswered questions, abandoned characters. Make sure that you weave in lots of sensory detail throughout the story, that you're showing your character's world in a three dimensional way rather than just telling the reader about it. You might need another set of eyes to help you figure out what needs to be fleshed in, what needs to be cut out—even with distance, sometimes it can be hard to see our own work clearly. So ask someone you trust to read it and give their opinion. Take their ideas seriously but continue to listen to your own gut. Ultimately you have the final say in your story. It's your vision, your baby. Congratulations on its wild and woolly birth!
The worst thing you can do when you revise your NaNo novel is take yourself too seriously. It's fine to take the work seriously—in fact, it's wonderful and important to take the work seriously—but as soon as you start to take yourself too seriously, you'll lose all the joy in the process. And you'll do your novel a great disservice. You'll find yourself clinging to every precious word, even when some those words stick out like weeds and desperately need to be hacked away. Remember: more than likely, these raw, juicy 50,000 words are just a road map to the novel they are meant to become. Revision is about burning away all the dross and shaping and honing what's left behind into something gorgeous and gleaming. When you take yourself too seriously, you'll feel every cut in your own heart; you'll start to resist change, and revision will be a very painful, maybe even nearly-impossible, experience. So relax. Have fun with the process. Give yourself and your novel room to breathe and grow. And don't be in a rush to send it out to agents and publishers. The first draft was written in a rush, yes, but now is the time to slow down, to craft the narrative in a more conscious and thoughtful way. Get your baby all cleaned up, all bright and shiny, before you send it out into the world. You have done something great this NaNo month; now you can make it even greater. I wish you the best of luck!
Next up: Kimberly Llewellyn. Kimberly is the author of four novels, including The Quest for the Holy Veil
Now that you're ready to rewrite a NaNoWriMo novel, pat yourself on the back for achieving your dream. You wrote a book! Congratulations! It's a huge accomplishment!
The time has come for revision. After all, the secret to good writing is in the rewriting. While you've written the first draft with a white-hot intensity, the best thing you can do when revising is to take your time. First, review your work for the big-picture stuff, such as pacing, plot, and character growth. After that, comes the more detailed editing for things like dialogue, conflict, and tension. Lastly, you'll want to do some final polishing, but before you do, let the book "cool." Put it away for a while---at least two weeks. That's right, just forget about it. Go to the movies, visit a museum, take walks, get reacquainted with friends and family (remember them?). Please don't skip this step! When you return for one final read, you will be refreshed and will catch things you never noticed before.
The worst thing you can do is rush the revision process and send the book to an agent or editor before it's ready. Avoid this temptation! First impressions count. You've got to have patience while rewriting and you must stay encouraged. While revising, tune out the voice in your head that worries your work might not be good enough. If you receive constructive criticism, view it objectively, deciding which suggestions are right for you and your book. Be thick skinned, methodical, and persistent! Taking your time during the revision phase is the best thing you can do for your novel because only then will it be ready for submission.
To help with revision, read books on craft and editing. Also, working with a critique partner or group will provide help and encouragement. Good luck!
Next, David Niall Wilson. David has been writing professionally since the mid 1980s. With twelve novels sold or published and over 150 short stories, including those collected in Defining Moments, his new book from World Fantasy Award Winning Sarob Press in the UK, and one produced feature-length screenplay, Godhead. David's most recent NaNoWriMo novel to be published was The Mote in Andrea's Eye. His next book is Ancient Eyes a dark fantasy novel of spiritual courage and dark, ancient evil, due from Bloodletting Press in late 2007. David's 2005 NaNoWriMo novel Vintage Soul recently sold to Thompson/Gale in hard cover and to Bad Moon Books in limited/signed hard cover.
Well, first off, I don't treat NaNoWriMo novels any differently than any other novel. When I'm working, I write two to three thousand words a day, sometimes more. Most of my novels have been completed in two months or less. My first published novel (not written for NaNoWriMo) was written in twenty-one days, and is still my most popular. That said, there are a lot of good and bad ideas involved with revising any project, and I'll do my best to cover the ones I think are most important, both positive, and negative. I'll tackle the bad idea first.
The worst thing you can do when your novel is complete it to slap it into an envelope, or an e-mail, and send it off to a publisher. I don't care how good you are, a novel is never completely clean and ready to go on the first run through. It's a good idea to step away from it, work on something else, play with your dog, and introduce yourself to the family you haven't seen much of since you typed that first page. Do not believe that because you put 50, 60, or even 100,000 words down on paper (or the screen) that it means you are ready for the best-seller list. It means that you've reached the end of stage one. You do not want to see the response you will get if you send that thing off sight unseen.
Among the best things you can do is to get yourself a small group of critical readers. Every year I start a Yahoo mailing list and let folks read along as I write my novel during NaNoWriMo. I collect their comments, their criticisms, and any praise they might have, but I don't pay any attention to it until I'm done with the first draft. Then, when the ink (or phosphor) has "dried," I start at the beginning and slowly go through the entire manuscript. I look at the things others have pointed out, and I always find things that bother me, or that I forgot. It usually takes two good solid runs at a manuscript for me to be reasonably satisfied and ready to present it as a finished novel. Then, I send it to my agent, he tells me why I'm wrong, and I start again. Writing the novel is the easy part.
And finally, Jon Merz. Jon is the author of over a dozen novels, including Parallax, which has been released to help raise funds for Horizons for Homeless Children. Jon lives in suburban Boston with his wife and two sons.
The worst thing you can do when you finish the first draft of any novel is to assume it's gold. It's not. It needs work, no matter what you might think. Don't become one of those writers who thinks everything they churn out—including their grocery list—is amazing. It ain't. And there's nothing worse that a presumptuous writer parading about as if they were the next Messiah. Ugh.
The second worst thing you can do is immediately start revising it. Don't. Put it away for a minimum of ten days and let go of the project for a while. Give your brain a chance to rest. When you come back to it after a rest, you'll have a much better perspective on the material now that it's fermented a bit.
The best thing you can do is believe in yourself. If you work extremely hard, persevere, and strive to make everything you write the best it can be, you will eventually see it in print. The world needs more writers—the average level of intelligence is plummeting at a ridiculous rate (just watch an episode of Amazing Race for proof—this week one of the contestants thought 100 came after 89. And we won't discuss how several of them pronounced Vilnius.) Anyway, my point is this: You want to be a writer and help enrich the world? Awesome. Work hard, play hard, and hang in there by the skin of your teeth. It's a tough fight, but anything worth achieving usually is. Congrats on finishing the first draft of your novel—now see the dream through to the end!
Thanks, authors! And happy NaNo off-season, everyone! If you have any suggestions on ways we could improve the event for 2008 (or really loved something we did this year and want to let us know about it), drop us a note in the Site and Message Board Feedback area of the forums.
Thanks so much to everyone who participated in 2007, and a special hug to our donors and Municipal Liaisons! We couldn't have done it without you.