Back to 'real' life and ready to keep writing

Today – 1 December – is an auspicious day.

 

It’s when hundreds of thousands of novelists around the world blink their eyes against the sky’s blue brilliance after they stagger outside for the first time in a month, as they have done for the past 16 years.

NaNo No-No

My NaNoWriMo is not off to a good start.

Unlike 2013, this year I felt I was organised before 1 November. I had characters. I had a plan. I had been reading non-fiction books to fill out areas of information where I was lacking.

Then the trouble began.

Mad month

November is going to be a crazy month.

I've signed up to tackle NaNoWriMo – National Novel Writing Month. The aim is to write a novel of at least 50,000 words during November. Plots, outlines and characters can be created beforehand, but the actually penning, or typing, of the text must take place in November.

At last check, more that 173,000 writers across the world had signed up. That's a lot of words, coffees, late nights and tortured creative types. So if a writer you know seems particularly stressed in November, cut them a bit of slack.