What a crazy month. NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) is always a lot, but this month I had a short trip at the end of week one this month that made it that much harder. Thankfully, I knew about it beforehand, and I was able to prepare for it. In this post, I’m going to go through my thought process while writing from the last eleven days.
Day One
The first day went great. I got almost 2500 words down and felt okay about them. My level of excitement was high, and I wanted to take advantage of it. I think I knew that it wouldn’t last. However, this year felt different (it still does). I think I can feel that this is the year my NaNoWriMo novel gets to make it to the next draft, and possibly further. Big expectations, I know, but I think I can do it.
Day Two
This day sucked. I felt like every word I wrote was crap. I still managed to get a whole bunch of words before I went to bed for the night. I wanted to mention this feeling because I think it’s common during NaNoWriMo and I want other people to feel less alone. And trust me: we’re all feeling it. It’s hard. And it isn’t going to be great until later. This is the foundation of the beautiful mansion we’re building.
Day Three – Seven
All these days went the same, with very few hiccups. I sat down and pieced together scenes from all over the book, trying to label them in a way that made sense. When I do NaNoWriMo, my goal is to open a document and write. I start at the beginning, and I don’t look back until I get to the end. I know that December is going to be messy since everything is all over the place, but it’s the only way that I can keep going and move forward.
I reached the day seven goal of 11,669 and continued until I had 12,456 by the end of the seventh. I felt so proud going into my trip with more words than I needed. I knew that I had some wiggle room and could afford to write fewer words per day. Which turned out to be completely necessary.
Day Eight – Ten
During the trip, I was working on other things and didn’t have a ton of time for writing. So, instead of writing new words, I spent my time bringing in parts of the previous version of this novel and editing them to fit the new plot. I’m not a fan of doing this, but I knew that it would help me not only keep on track but keep my brain working on my novel and figuring out the plot. I reached 18,085 words by the end of the tenth and I was feeling pretty good about it. Though many of those words aren’t edited yet, I do have lots of notes on them and can move forward from where it is.
Day Eleven
Day eleven was hard. I was exhausted from my trip and only managed to write three words. It kept up my streak, but I’m around 2000 words behind. I wanted so badly to write more, but my brain just told me to sleep.
Today
Today is the twelfth. The goal for today is 20,004 and I’m only at 18,088. I’m hoping to pull ahead again, but I know that I might not be able to today. I’m feeling lost, just like I was this time last year. All the flaws in my plotting are apparent now and I feel like I need to stop and fix everything. I’m trying not to. I know that I need to push forwards. I know that most of the scenes I need to write aren’t dependant on the big things, but the little ones. Those are easy for me to change later. Editing is for December.
I know that my plot has issues. Things that were easier the last time I wrote this are struggling to come through. I haven’t written in a long time, and I think it shows. It’s hard for me to keep going when I have those thoughts in my head. Hence why I’m sitting here writing an update post instead of writing my actual novel. What is an author if not a professional procrastinator?
My next update is going to be on the seventeenth. 28,339 is the word count to aim for that day. I’m going to aim to be at 30,000 by then. I want to challenge myself to get ahead since this novel is going to need more than 50,000 words anyways. I don’t have any days I want to take off from here on out, so I don’t think it’ll be an issue.
If you’re doing NaNoWriMo, how’s your word count going? Are you doing a goal other than a novel or a word count other than 50,000? Need a friend for encouragement? Send me a message on Instagram @litandleta and let me know how you’re doing!
Lit&Leta 
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