NaNoWriMo: No

For the past four years, I've participated in National Novel Writing Month http://www.nanowrimo.org/. The goal is to write 50,000 words of a completely new work. If you hit 50K, you're a winner.

My first two attempts were pitiful; I only lasted a few days. In 2008, I made it to 40,000 words. I was proud of myself--it was the longest piece I had ever written. Last year I won. NaNoWriMo showed me that I can write consistently; I can write every day; I can produce output.

NaNoWriMo is about quantity, not quality. Quality is for another draft.

Of my two novels I completed, one is like junk candy. The other has some good features, but not enough to salvage the novel as a whole. It would be more efficient to pull out the good and put it in another work than to try to fix the the novel.

This year, NaNoWriMo is not for me. For one thing, I don't think I can win. I know that's a bad attitude. I know I can learn from failure. I know that I have to be willing do something badly in order to do it well. I know.

Right now my heart isn't in writing a novel. But I want to set some writing goals for the month.

1. I will blog every day this month.
2. I will review and finalize my Mets piece.
3. I will work on my travel memoirs, starting with Russia and Egypt trips.
4. I will make my goal number 3 more concrete (i.e. decide on a word count.)

Let's get it started.