NaNoWriMo Begins!

 It's time to start NaNoWriMo! Yay! 

Are you ready to write the next great 50,000 words of genius? 

It's okay if you're not. Just fire up that old computer/tablet/writing instrument and just write.  Yes, that's the way to do it. 

The best way to start NaNo when you have no idea what to write is to just write something. Don't judge whether its good or bad, just get it down. You can edit/fix after you got those 50,000 down. 

If you have a story idea then you're ahead of most in the game. There's a lot of people who have no idea what to write and they are almost ready to give up before they start. 

Please don't give up! You can do it!

Without an idea the advice to "just write" can still be intimidating. So, what to do? Here's some ways to get started; 

1. Google writing prompts. These are brief story starter ideas that can spark your imagination. You can also google these in your favorite genre. Love romances (the biggest industry in publishing) then put into the search engine; Romance Story Prompts. Sci-fi? Historical? Horror? Erotica? It's all there somewhere on the web. 

2. Ask yourself "What if" and then let your imagination go. What if a man has a body in his trunk? What if he get's back ended and the trunk pops open? What if a woman accepts a date with a man then discovers his best friend is the man who is the father of her kid - and she never told him he was the father? What if a space alien landed in your back yard. He's hurt. Do you nurse him back to health or call the cops? What if you go out for a walk at night and are bitten by a vampire? Werewolf? What if you discover your mother is witch? 

3. Get a book off your self. Close your eyes, open to a random page and point. That sentence is the first sentence of your novel. (Yes, this one is a big challenge. Are you up for it?)

4. Find a piece of artwork. Either in your home or store or anywhere you happen to be. Stare at it and then write about what's next for that picture? Is it a picture of a house? (I have Thomas Kincade pics here) Who lives in that house? What if something happened there? Ghosts? Did the in-laws move in? Did the woman who lives there find a strange animal and raises it only to find out it's a baby dinosaur? 

5. What if you were an alien. What would your impressions of the earth be when you landed. What if you were a time traveler? Would you go forward or back in time and what would you find? 

Remember stories are everywhere. Set your imagination loose and find those story lines that are uniquely yours. It's all good. 

Happy NaNoWriMo! You got this! 

National Novel Writing Month? Do You?

Here comes November! In writer's circles this is known as National Novel Writing Month where you pump out 50,000 words to make a book.  I've done it before and, although November can be a busy month as it starts the holiday season, it's possible.

The NANOWRIMO site lets you sign up and find fellow NANO-ers to write with and support each other. I've never used that site, but I see some regions where a lot of people signed up. They go to coffee houses and gather in groups to pump out their 50,000 words. Sounds like fun?

My daughter, a food blogger, likes to write in coffee houses. I'm not sure. I've always written better in a cave. A desk in the corner with the door shut. I find coffee houses noisy and distracting.

Then we have the virtual facebook NANOWRIMO which is part of the regular NANO but maybe less organized with  more easy online access. (Others have set up pages too. NANO world on facebook. )

I'm in the middle of a major edit for my latest WIP and really want to get it done. Would I be a NANO cheater if I just finished that work for NANO? It's a lot longer than 50,000 so it's still a lot of work. A fellow writer isn't sure that qualifies. Now I sit on the edge of writing something totally new or finishing the WIP and I'm not sure which way to go.

So, do you NANO? Are you ready for the challenge?