National Novel Writing Month and I are in Splitsville, the outs, we’ve sold the house and gone our separate ways, we’re footloose and fancy free, we’re at D-I-V-O-R-C-E.
Now, don’t get me wrong. In the first week of the annual event of literary frenzy, I’ve plowed under nearly 11,000 words on my new project, a terrific jump-start that will serve me well in the coming months as I lurch toward the first-draft finish line. And I’ll always be thankful for NaNoWriMo for launching my debut novel, 600 Hours of Edward, in 2008. Further, I plan to write on every available day for the remainder of November, just like the thousands of people who are having a monthlong love affair with their keyboards. (After November and all the hoopla pass, I’ll still be writing daily. It’s what I do.)
So it’s not that I’ve taken up with another lover. It’s that it’s no longer useful for me to meet the demands of this particular lover (specifically, her insatiable need for words — at least 50,000 of them by the end of the month). This project of mine will require more contemplation than that, and the chains will be moved in more peripatetic (I love the word “peripatetic”) bunches — 500 words here, 247 there, 3,000 or so on the occasional all-day dash. I’ll reach 50,000 words in due time, and beyond that, I think, will lie the end of the first draft.
See, something happened between NaNoWriMo 2008 and NaNoWriMo 2009: I wrote a second novel. Principal writing took me about three months. Rewriting and revising took me a couple of months after that. I enjoyed that pace. It worked for me. And now I realize that given the choice between the mad dash and the purposeful march, I’ll take the latter. Every time.
Make no mistake: I’ll finish the project I started for this year’s NaNoWriMo. But it will be on my terms, not hers. NaNoWriMo, this year and probably in years to come, is a project starter for me now, not a means of filling a quota.
Craig Lancaster | A Mind Adrift in the West 
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November 7, 2009 at 11:17 am
Kristin Hanes
That is a good way of looking at it. I was debating whether or not to do it this year, but think I should try to finish my novel first. I have 40,000 words, and if I took a break to write another book, I might not ever finish the first.
November 7, 2009 at 12:20 pm
Jeremy Lape
Thanks, Craig, for taking such a public and powerful stand. I find strength and inspiration in your decision. When the NaNoites knock on your door and try to talk you into coming back and finishing with them, don’t let them in, or talk to them or even accept their little pamphlets. They want to control your mind, and your writing output.
NaNoWriMo has done some wonderful things, but like all institutions that rise up with good intentions, eventually they become legalistic about their doctrines and values, and soon, The Great Seperation occurs: A wall rises up, formed with the bones of those who wrote 49,999 words or less in a given November. On The Right Side will be the Achievers. They are few, but they are the pre-ordained. It’s a cruel thing to offer Hope to the masses when only a Chosen Few have any chance of achieving their brand of “glory.” If more people like you, who have been to the Promised Land of 50k Words In A Month, will take Saloman Rushdie-like positions, fearless of man or beast, then there far fewer people entering December so dispirited they have to shop their way out of their depression. Oh, people have no idea that the National Retailers Association is the secret society behind the NaNo’s down in Alameda. But it’s true. Check it out. It’s so secret, you can Google it and Nothing will come up. Proof.
We wait for your next finely polished work. You guide us non-NaNo-ers someone to follow thru these dark days of November, and an example to follow in December, and every month after.
Signed,
A Walking Wounded Survivor of Previous Novermberists.
November 7, 2009 at 6:51 pm
Jim Thomsen
I may follow suit. But my reasons won’t be nearly as good … because my reasons for starting NaNoWriMo this year weren’t nearly as good. But for now, I’m being irrationally stubborn about it. Mostly because actual writing (as opposed to a year spent researching and interviewing) makes me happy.
November 7, 2009 at 7:01 pm
craiglancaster
Yeah, I made the decision last night, when I was starting to feel stressed out about my word count on a project that I know in my bones I’ll finish. That’s just stupid. Writing a novel is hard enough without that kind of self-applied pressure.
November 8, 2009 at 9:17 am
Liz C
I puzzled over this post for awhile. trying to figure out why I don’t feel the same. Now I think I get it.
The difference is that you are writing a novel, and you will still be writing a novel on Dec. 1st. I, however, am ‘doing NaNoWriMo’, and on Dec. 1st I will burn my effort onto a CD, file it away with last year’s, and move on to the next shiny pursuit. I am not a writer (plus I have a horrendously short attention span and low tolerance for frustration) and without the artificial structure of NaNo I would certainly bail the first time I got stuck.
But with NaNo I and tens of thousands of others like me can enjoy thirty days of dropping in and out of flow state, and even spend odd moments imagining what might happen if we actually did try to edit this thing into something readable.
I am in awe of folks who can do this writing thing without the peer pressure of 100,000 other fanatics and the promise of ‘I’m a winner ‘web badges to decorate their blogs.
You go, boy!
🙂
November 10, 2009 at 4:58 pm
kristentsetsi
Makes sense to me, Craig. I was never very interested in participating in NaNo – as you said, too much pressure. However, it did (and continues) to function as a great motivator for me to finish “Dan Palace.” I’m writing as much as I want per day, the “beginning” point was somewhere at the 60,000 word mark, and I think I’ll finish the first draft in the next couple of days. But, aside from this brief lapse reading your blog entry, I’m abstaining from all online social networking and am devoting the month to writing, revising, reading, and anything else that inspires better writing/the completion of this novel. I doubt I’ll ever officially participate in Nano, but I can see it as an “Okay, let’s get down to business and do some writing” kick in the butt every year or so.
November 10, 2009 at 10:31 pm
PJT
After reading your first novel, I trust you to know how things should end.
November 17, 2009 at 11:03 am
A few words before I go « Craig Lancaster | A Mind Adrift in the West
[…] I would be remiss if I didn’t say, again, how happy I am that I ducked out of NaNoWriMo this year. Progress on the new project has been impeded by a hundred […]