Tag Archives: JuNoWriMo

by

My Week In Review – ROW80 Check-In 9

Hello gentle reader,

june is here and it’s time for another weekly check-in! I hope you had a great and productive week. Mine had its ups and downs…

ROW80 Check-In

ROW80 Logo

My goal for this round is to write every day.

This week however I… didn’t write. At all. I was waiting to hear back from my beta readers, and instead of writing, I read books and helped my CPs with their query letter/manuscript/blogs.

TV Show of the Week

Supernatural-Season 8

Supernatural – Season 8 (CW)

This week I’ve been catching up on the last season of Supernatural. This show isn’t what it used to be, but I still love Dean and Sam. And Castiel when he shows up.

Good News of the Week

This week, Rachel O’Laughlin launched her Street Team for the release of her Epic Fantasy novel. You can sign up and join the fun here!

Links of the Week

On my blog I posted about the Versatile Blogger Award here and shared the ups and downs of my week here (with GIFs!).

On There And Draft Again I posted about the writing device known as Deus Ex Machina.

And JuNoWriMo has started! If you need a writing challenge to help you write a book in a month, do consider joining, it’s not too late!

Next week

Next week on my blog I will host a book giveaway. I have recently gained a lot of new followers and I want to say thank you!

How was your week? Make sure to share your writing progress and what inspired you this week in the comment section below!

by

Making the most of a Novel Writing Month

Hello gentle reader,

Two days ago Camp NaNoWriMo ended and I didn’t “win” it.

camp_nano_logo

The idea behind such a writing challenge (whether it is the original NaNoWriMo in November, JuNoWriMo in June or Camp NaNoWriMo in April and July) is to write a 50,000-word novel in 30 days. All you have to do as a writer is sit down and write 1667 words a day for 30 days and you end up with a complete first draft on the last day of the challenge, which makes you a challenge “winner”.

That’s in theory, at least.

As you may know from following this blog or my Twitter feed, I am not a full-time writer. I have a Crazy Day Job which keeps me busy for at least 60 hours a week. I have to sleep, eat and show my face outside every day. I can’t just hide in my writing cave for a month, even if I really want to. So a challenge like Camp NaNoWriMo doesn’t sound like something I should have even tried to do, since it was clear from the start winning was going to be hard, if not impossible.

But I still made the most of Camp NaNoWriMo in April. Here are my tips to make the most of a Novel Writing Month challenge when you don’t have time for a Novel Writing Month challenge…

1) Be prepared.

Before you dive in the writing challenge, know what you are going to write. Have a rough outline for your plot, some ideas for your characters and your themes. This will help you not getting “stuck”.

2) Set yourself a goal.

1667 words every day is too much for me, I know that. I write slowly (700 words in 60 minutes at best) and I never have more than two hours a day to write. So during Camp NaNoWriMo, I decided to write 500 words a day.

3) Play with the rules.

Writing a first draft implies “not looking back”, even “word vomiting”. Write now, edit later. I can’t do that. Because I have so little time to write, I need to know what I’m writing isn’t going to end up deleted when I read it again at the end of the month. So I edit as I go.

4) Take part in writing sprints on Twitter.

A Novel Writing Month is about community. As writers, we can feel pretty lonely sometimes. A writing challenge is a great way to find other writers online, people who are also trying to write a novel in a month. Motivation and perseverance stems from talking to them, and sharing our experience.

5) Whatever your wordcount in the end, it is a success, because YOU WROTE WORDS. I wrote 23,000 words in April. That’s a third of a novel, guys. And I’m happy with that.

Have you ever taken part in a Novel Writing Month? How did it go for you? What advice would you give to new participants? Feel free to leave me a comment below!

by

ROW80 Check-In #9 and JuNoWriMo update: On Procrastination

Hello gentle reader,

For the past two weeks I have been neglecting my fellow ROWers and instead focusing on the JuNoWriMo writing challenge. For those who don’t know what JuNoWriMo is, check out this post. Oh, and if you’re reading this because you’re looking for my awesome “Clear Your Shelf” Giveaway, you’ll need to look a little bit further: here.

 With JuNoWriMo, my goal is to write every day, even if I don’t make the 50,000-word goal. I hesitated a while before deciding to join in, for two reasons. First, I spend an average of 62 hours a week at work, which means that I only write between 30 minutes and an hour a day. Second, I am a slow writer: I cannot spill 1000 words onto a page in half an hour. So the prospect of having to write an average of 1667 words a day was quite frightening. But I still decided to do the challenge, as it is a great way to keep motivated and to interact with fellow writers.

So how have I been doing, you ask? I have been writing every single day, which I am very happy about. My word count, however, has been lower than the required average of 1667 words a day. As of today my average is 1160 words a day. But I am interacting with fellow writers and keeping motivated (sprints on Twitter are especially good for me!).

What JuNoWriMo has helped me do so far is fighting procrastination. You see, gentle reader, I am terrible when it comes to putting things off. At the beginning of the challenge, I was like this:

Then I set this image as my wall paper on my laptop:

And things got better.

So now, I just…

And it’s been working well so far.

How have you been doing with your writing challenges? Do you have to fight procrastination? How do you do it?

Here is theLinky for the other ROW80 participants…

Have a great week and happy writing!

by

ROW80 Check-In #8

Hello gentle reader,

I’m late for this check-in, as I have just returned from London (for those of you who don’t live in the UK, we enjoy a four-day weekend here for the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee). Also this is my last ROW80 check-in for this round, as I’m now done with my one and only goal:

self-edit my YA Fantasy novel The Last Queen.

I’m so happy I am done with this I could sing.

And now that The Last Queen is off living its own destiny, I’m now focusing on the JuNoWriMo challenge: my goal is to write every day, even if I don’t make the 50,000-word goal.

So thank you, fellow ROW80ers, this has been very formative for me.

And let’s not forget the Linky…

Have a great week and happy writing!

by

Preparing for JuNoWriMo

Hello gentle reader,

this week I have been getting ready for JuNoWriMo and it is all very exciting…

What is JuNoWriMo?

JuNoWriMo means “June Novel Writing Month”. It was started by Becca J. Campbell and Anna Howard and inspired by NaNoWriMo. The idea is to write the first draft of a 50,000 word book in 30 days. That’s an average of 1667 words per day.  The nice part of the challenge is that you also get to support and interact with other writers.

Getting ready…

The first edition of JuNoWriMo will start on Friday, June 1st and in the meantime, author  Aaron Pogue has been giving his advice on the JuNoWriMo blog to prepare the challenge: in a great series of posts, the idea was to help participants with their synopsis, character description, conflict resolution cycle, and so on… It is worth checking out if you’re interested in prewriting pointers.

Why am I participating?

During the past year, I have written and self-edited the first book in my Epic Fantasy trilogy THE DARKLANDS. I will soon start looking for an agent with it, but in the meantime, I want to take a break from that story. Thus, JuNoWriMo is for me the perfect opportunity to put THE DARKLANDS in a drawer for a month and to work on something else.

This month, I want to write a short YA dystopian novel which has been at the back of my mind for a while. When I say “short”, it is compared to the novel I just finished, which is over 100K… The working title for my JuNoWriMo WIP is BLACK ROSES, but it will most certainly change once I have completed the story. I usually come up with a definite title halfway through the writing process.

What is my JuNoWriMo novel about?

BLACK ROSES is set on the American continent at the end of the 22d Century. A virus has wiped out most of the world population ten years earlier. The only survivors are Humans (who weren’t affected by the virus) and Immortals (who have survived the virus and been turned into supernatural beings). Immortals rule the country and its capital New Wentworth, while Humans live on the margin. However, a third category of people is caught between them: Keepers have survived the virus but haven’t been turned into Immortals. The ruling class needs them in their new society, making them targets for rebel Humans. Seventeen-year-old Nessa is a Keeper. To her, this Friday is just like any other day. She hasn’t planned that Humans would choose it to stage a rebellion, that her life would suddenly be in danger, or that she would fall in love.

Why have I decided to write this specific story for JuNoWriMo?

I have always liked dystopian stories, even when they were just called Science-Fiction. I had the idea for BLACK ROSES years ago: I wrote a synopsis and a few key scenes before filing the thing away. Then the YA dystopian genre took over the world, and I started thinking ‘Maybe I should try and write that story after all.’ I don’t really intend to try and publish it, since the market is now saturated with YA Dystopian stories, but I think I will enjoy writing it in a short amount of time and having my beta readers read it. It will be a good way for me to hone my skills.

Interested in joining the madness?

Sign up for JuNoWriMo here.