The first time I tried NaNoWriMo, I had to overcome numerous hurdles to get my word count in. I first decided to do NaNoWriMo on Oct. 29th. My wife thought it would be a good idea. So I had two whole days to plan the novel and prep up Scrivener for NaNo. Two days in, My computer crashed. I had to spend two days fixing it… then three more waiting for Dropbox to load in enough files that I could pause synchronization and get back to work on the novel.
Scrivener recalculated my word count, and estimated I needed 2100 words a day to win NaNo. Not only did I win NaNoWriMo, but I finished four days early. As I uploaded my word count to Twitter, I kept seeing posts from desperate people, tweets that shattered my world – “I got 800 words the first day, 400 the next. I’ve only got 2400 words in, so I guess I failed #NaNoWriMo again.”
What’s Gone wrong?
What has gone wrong is one of three issues.
- You think you’re a pants’er. I’ve really dealt with this one at length and should let this go – but seriously, this outmoded way of thinking is destroying more writers than anything else. If you have written four novels in four years through pants’ing then you’re a pants’er. If you’ve never finished a novel, you think you’re a pants’er but you’re not. Time to start planning your novel.
- Your story failed at the premise. This actually describes 8 out of 10 novel attempts. I literally have this specter rise up time and again. If I start a novel and it doesn’t have enough story to write, then it failed at the premise. The answer to this is simple – if you planned your novel sufficiently, you’d have known ten minutes into the process you didn’t have enough story to write, and would have thought up another idea.
- You came up with a character and not a plot. This is common, actually. You get so caught up in this really neat protagonist you forgot they have to do something. Think of your elevator pitch. If you say, “My novel is about this girl, and she’s a pet groomer by day…” warning sign. You need to be talking about what’s happening and what she needs to DO to stop it!
What to do this year
The answer is very simple – I deal with this every September as we approach NaNoWriMo. I no longer support the organization, but I support the event.
This year, you need to follow my daily steps, following them to the letter. They seem like a lot of work, but compared to one writer who’s got an entire workbook on planning characters so detailed she probably considers me a reckless pants’er!
Here’s what you need to be able to write 2100 words a day. You need to know just four things, and they get answered in the planning process:
What the overall plot of the novel is
What happens prior to this scene
What must happen in this scene (the scene outcome)
How this scene exits and creates the next scene.
That’s pretty much it. If I know this is the scene where they find the skateboard and they need to make a break for it, I know #3. If I know they broke in through a basement window, I know #2. If I planned, I know the entire plot synopsis, that’s #1. If I know the Tyrannosaurus is waiting outside the door, I know #4.
Knowing this, I can easily write 2400 words in one night. That can be three scenes. Bang, bang, bang! And I’m ready for bed, thinking ahead to tomorrow’s scenes.
A project with no deadlines is a dead project Click To TweetThis is the strength of NaNoWriMo. I guarantee that midnight Nov. 30, Nano ends – whether your book is done or not. If you know 1 through 4 above, if you planned sufficiently, if you have a story that doesn’t fail at the premise, and if you have a plot (not just a character) and you know 1-4 above – you’ll find the only limits on how many words you write a night literally is your Word Per minute output!
How many of you have failed Nanowrimo? What do you think the cause is?
