Who knew novel-writing could be this much fun?

Categories NaNoWriMo, Self-Discovery, What I've Learned, Writing Life

I admit it. I’m one of those people who has spent her whole life composing novels in her head and never writing one. I even try to live my life as if it were a novel. Oh, don’t get me wrong. I do write. I’ve even been published (aside from these blogs), but the idea of spending months or even years working on a full-length novel (as many well-known authors have confessed to doing) really holds no appeal for a poet and essayist. I like something I can complete in one or two sittings. So when I heard about NaNoWriMo, a challenge to write a complete rough draft of a novel during the month of November, my first reaction was to dismiss the idea of wanting to write a novel in the first place. After all, if I don’t want to write one, why consider writing one in 30 days? That’s 29 days and 22 hours more than it takes me to write anything else!

But I had to admit to myself that it was always a secret ambition of mine to compete with all those overachieving writer friends of mine who have at least one novel to their names. So finally, after all these years of wimping out in the novel department, I decided to give it a go, not having much training on how to write something as complex and important as a novel.  About all I knew was that I’d need to research characters and settings about which I knew little, and create a plot out of thin air. Well, NaNoWriMo makes all that seem like needless worry. As Chris Baty, the founder wrote, No Plot, No Problem.

I am now having a blast spinning gold (well, maybe not gold yet, but something) out of nothing. The characters and plot are evolving, talking their way out of my head to my finger tips, to the keys and onto the screen. I can’t wait to hit the computer every evening and type for 3 hours, just to see how it’s going to turn out. It’s like reading a book that hasn’t been written yet. Oh wait! I’m the one waving my wand and watching the paragraphs grow into chapters! I feel like a sorcerer!

I coach creative people who want to live an artful life.

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