Here we go again. 50,000 words in 30 days. That’s the National Novel Writing Month challenge. Day two and I’m in 1950 words. Not a lot, but I’m doing it differently from the way I did my first challenge.
This year I’m a *pantser*- that’s a writer who didn’t use an outline and is writing by the seat of their pants. Last year my room looked like the Op Center at NORAD. Giant post-it notes stuck to walls with timelines and names and an area to plot the progression of the manuscript.
I probably should have done it the same way this year – but at the very last minute, and I mean less than twenty four hours until go-time- I decided not to use the month for a non-fiction book of blessings that I’m working on. I had to get back to the crazy storyline I started last year in the paranormal/action/romance series, The Leelanau Chronicles.
The thing about NaNoWriMo that makes it so much fun and ridiculously difficult at the same time is that you aren’t supposed to edit as you write. Word count is the name of the game. Just slap whatever comes into your head down on the paper and keep on going. There will be time to weed out the garbage and fix all the mistakes after November 30 when the clock strikes midnight.
That’s easier said than done. The primal urge to edit our writing is akin to the reflex of salivating when we smell cookies baking or when we see Tom Hiddleson doing anything adorable. It is so hard to step away from the bad sentence…the atrocious grammar…the phrase that makes no fricking sense at all.
So I’m in it now and I won’t come out until I get to the other side of this story. See you at the finish line……
My working book cover for inspiration-
Word Ninja Girl 
I’m doing NaNoWriMo too – my first time. I started off as a total Pantster, but then I had a slight meltdown yesterday because there was no organization, no plan, no nothing. I ended up breaking the cardinal rule and started editing and rewriting. Oops. I think the problem was that I didn’t have any glitter. If I had had glitter, that probably would have calmed me right down and I wouldn’t have been able to resist the nagging voice of my inner editor.