Here’s my official NaNoWriMo completion certificate. If you “won,” be sure to get yours too!
Now concludes NaNoWriMo. If you wrote 50,000 words this month, you officially win. If you didn’t, that doesn’t mean you lost. Did you write more than you normally would have? If so, you win!
Here are my latest NaNoWriMo stats. It lies about how many words I’ve written today. I just haven’t added any more words to my NaNo project.
I finished NaNoWriMo Tuesday, and guess what? I haven’t stopped writing since! Today, I am joining a writing challenge hosted by Chuck Wendig over at the TerribleMinds blog. It’s a five part challenge in which participants will collaborate to write several flash fiction pieces 200 words at a time.
To participate, this week you should write the first 200 words of a story and post it to your blog. Then head over to TerribleMinds (where you can also find full details of the challenge) and share a link to your post. The next week, you will choose another author’s first 200 words (maybe even mine!) and write the second 200 words of that author’s story. The following week, you will choose yet another story and add an additional 200 words of your own, and so forth, until you have written a total of 1000 words on 5 different stories.
Here’s a screen shot from the blog that is sponsoring the award. Go check it out!
Do you enjoy this writers blog? If so, do me a favor and go nominate my blog for the 2013 Top 10 Blogs for Writers contest. I need at least two nominations in order to be considered for the award and would greatly appreciate your input.
Writing: Just DO it already! | Writing (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
It’s Day 7, and I have changed my mind. I am doing NaNoWriMo after all. There’s nothing like waiting a week to decide you want to write 50,000 words like everyone else. I have been sitting here reading blog posts about everyone else’s NaNo projects and feeling jealous. And making excuses for why I couldn’t do it too.
Then I got an idea. I finally looked myself in the computer screen and said, “Shut up with the excuses already. Sit your ass down in that chair and start writing.”
“In “Shooting an Elephant,” George Orwell tells about an incident that forced him to act in a manner contrary to his better instincts. Write a narrative about a time you faced a disturbing conflict and ended up doing something you later regretted” (p. 172).
Care to join us? Freewrite on the above topic for a minimum of 10 minutes, then share your freewrite in the comments below. Or, you may decide to use the material you generate to write a narrative essay. If so, you may post your essay on your own blog or website and share a link to your essay in the comments below.
Today’s library haul… who says fiction writing doesn’t require research?
I had a great time with the summer writing challenge and got to know several of you quite well in the process. I want to thank everyone one more time for participating. If you managed to write even just a few more pages than you would have otherwise, then I consider the challenge a success!
Since I am not ready to stop challenging myself, this morning, I changed the name of my Write Your Novel this Summer Facebook page to “Write Your Novel this Season.” I think it’s a good idea to keep cranking out new material even while you are working on revisions for your previous stories. What do you think?
What’s next? Well, I did a complete read-through of my “Bees to Honey” novel (this is not a title, just a descriptive phrase to keep track of which novel is which) and wrote a few new scenes. I have reached the point where I need to do a ton of research on a certain element of my story before I do too much more writing. So, I went to the library this morning and picked up a huge stack of source material. I have a LOT of reading ahead of me! Continue reading “Are you ready to write a novel this season?”→
I like to include “feelings” with number five, as it is often important to describe how something makes you “feel” in addition to how certain elements might “feel” to the touch. Just remember, it is equally essential to “show” how something makes you feel rather than “telling” your reader about it. So, try to avoid using the word, “feel” in your writing.
As summer draws to a close, it’s time to start thinking about apple pies and second drafts. Time to harvest the fruits of our labor!
Today is the official last day of summer. The time has come to wrap up the Write Your Novel this Summer Challenge. I don’t know about you, but I am feeling *super* productive after completing this challenge.
For those of you who did not complete your first draft, that’s okay. Did you keep writing anyway? That’s the important thing. As long as you keep writing, you will get there eventually. Keep at it!
A few of you have contacted me to let me know when you did complete the first drafts of your novels. Congratulations on a job well finished!
I recommend this book for any writer who would like to study the art of taking a reader on a journey without the reader knowing where she is going until she arrives.
I have said it before, and I will say it again. I do not believe that you should share the first draft of your novel with anyone – ANYONE — until it is complete. The more I learn, the more I believe this to be true.
I just finished reading Stolen: A Letter to My Captor by Lucy Christopher. I can’t help but picture myself in a writer’s critique group with the author, bashing her work and ensuring this novel never comes to fruition. I wouldn’t kill her darling for her on purpose. But not being able to read through to the end of her story, there is no way I could possibly understand what she was attempting to do as she wrote this novel. Continue reading “When it is bad to get feedback on your writing”→
I have a lot more time for reading since graduation and go to the library at least once a week now.
One of my students started out this semestercomplaining about how much work she has to do in my class. I cannot even tell you how many times she said, “I don’t have time for this” on the first day of class. She was oblivious to her classmates glaring at her as if they wanted to ask if she truly believes she is the only person who has a life outside of school.
As the semester progresses, this same student keeps asking me if she really has to do all of the practice lessons or if she can only turn in the graded assessments and skip everything else. I am honestly sick to death of hearing it.
This week, I finally told her, “Look. It’s your choice. You do what you have to do. If you fail your assessments because you chose not to complete the practice lessons, then you will have to suffer the consequences.”
Write on the World 