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This was probably the first time in awhile where I deliberately chose not to participate (usually I'm more passive about it--"oh, it's 11/5 already and I forgot...oh well, too late now"). However, this was also the first time I really thought about why I chose not to this time. There's a few reasons why I don't do it, and they have nothing to do with it being a good/bad/stupid/brilliant writing exercise:
--My word count varies from day to day. I've had days where I've written 4,000 words in the span of three hours, and there's been days when I had to strangle my brain just so I could eke out 600 in two. It really depends on what I'm working on and where I am in the project.
--While writing around 1700 words a day for a whole month is doable, I'm just too much of a damn perfectionist (that is, I'm a revise-as-I-go type of writer for the most part), and if I start out cold with little or no idea where it's going, then I'm setting myself up for failure. Day One will be new words, Day Two will be rereading and touching up Day One's work, and leaving very little time left for Day Two's expected word count.
--While I can certainly 'make it up as I go along', my writing is that much slower when I do. If I'm working from a completely clean slate, unless the book is going to be a relatively simple plot with little worldbuilding, I just won't be able to squeeze it into thirty days.
--I'd feel like I'm cheating if I did an outline beforehand. I know, it doesn't matter, but that's just the way I am. I normally don't do complete outlines, but I plan at least a chapter or so ahead while writing, so I'm not completely winging it.
--Personal events have gotten in the way over the years. Vacations, moving preparations, day job workload, personal stress...all of these have gotten in the way in the past, and I've decided that it's just not worth the extra stress, especially it being fourth quarter.
--I can work on a deadline, even if I do hem and haw all the way (and thankfully![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
emmalyon puts up with it). But too many times I've gone into NaNoWriMo with the best of intentions only to fail miserably about a week or so later. Last year it was because I realized my NaNo project (a "complete rewrite" exercise for A Dvision of Souls) was going in a direction I did not want it to go, and stopped it before I wasted any more of my time.
All that said...
The weekly schedule I created at the start of this year was probably the best idea I've had for my writing in the last decade. I knew that setting up some sort of ritual would work, considering that from 2000 to 2005 I was down cellar in the Belfry almost every single night from 7pm to 9pm, listening to my latest CD purchases and hammering out at least a thousand new words for the trilogy (or near the end, for Love Like Blood). I didn't get a chance to work on that for the latter half of the decade due to being newly married, moving across the country, among other things. There was also the deliberate avoidance of writing out of frustration, which I've gone on about here on LJ before. Suffice it to say, I believe finishing the trilogy really put me back on track there.
The long and short of all of this? I don't think I can finish a novel in thirty days, not without causing aggravation...but I could conceivably finish one in a year if I follow a schedule. And I'm happy with that.
--My word count varies from day to day. I've had days where I've written 4,000 words in the span of three hours, and there's been days when I had to strangle my brain just so I could eke out 600 in two. It really depends on what I'm working on and where I am in the project.
--While writing around 1700 words a day for a whole month is doable, I'm just too much of a damn perfectionist (that is, I'm a revise-as-I-go type of writer for the most part), and if I start out cold with little or no idea where it's going, then I'm setting myself up for failure. Day One will be new words, Day Two will be rereading and touching up Day One's work, and leaving very little time left for Day Two's expected word count.
--While I can certainly 'make it up as I go along', my writing is that much slower when I do. If I'm working from a completely clean slate, unless the book is going to be a relatively simple plot with little worldbuilding, I just won't be able to squeeze it into thirty days.
--I'd feel like I'm cheating if I did an outline beforehand. I know, it doesn't matter, but that's just the way I am. I normally don't do complete outlines, but I plan at least a chapter or so ahead while writing, so I'm not completely winging it.
--Personal events have gotten in the way over the years. Vacations, moving preparations, day job workload, personal stress...all of these have gotten in the way in the past, and I've decided that it's just not worth the extra stress, especially it being fourth quarter.
--I can work on a deadline, even if I do hem and haw all the way (and thankfully
emmalyon puts up with it). But too many times I've gone into NaNoWriMo with the best of intentions only to fail miserably about a week or so later. Last year it was because I realized my NaNo project (a "complete rewrite" exercise for A Dvision of Souls) was going in a direction I did not want it to go, and stopped it before I wasted any more of my time. All that said...
The weekly schedule I created at the start of this year was probably the best idea I've had for my writing in the last decade. I knew that setting up some sort of ritual would work, considering that from 2000 to 2005 I was down cellar in the Belfry almost every single night from 7pm to 9pm, listening to my latest CD purchases and hammering out at least a thousand new words for the trilogy (or near the end, for Love Like Blood). I didn't get a chance to work on that for the latter half of the decade due to being newly married, moving across the country, among other things. There was also the deliberate avoidance of writing out of frustration, which I've gone on about here on LJ before. Suffice it to say, I believe finishing the trilogy really put me back on track there.
The long and short of all of this? I don't think I can finish a novel in thirty days, not without causing aggravation...but I could conceivably finish one in a year if I follow a schedule. And I'm happy with that.
