It’s hard to say why, but there’s something about a challenge that gets me excited.
Last November during National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) I embarked on a 30 day journey of literary abandon. I did what few had ever thought of doing, and even fewer accomplished.
I wrote a book.
Now, I must concede, this novel, naïvely titled “This Crazy Little Thing Called Life,” belongs in a more suitable place than your bookshelf. You might want to try the garbage can.
If you ask some of my friends, though, they will tell you that it was one of their favorite books.
“I’m sorry,” I tell them. “It appears you haven’t yet met the English department. I’m sure they’d be happy to direct you to some books with literary value.”
Despite how indescribably awful my book is. I can tell you that there is no feeling better than looking at a dimly lit computer screen at 11:47 p.m. on November 31 with a 50,000-word novel you just wrote in front of you. There is also no worse feeling than on December 15 when you realize the novel you just wrote was garbage.
However, NaNoWriMo offers so much more than the opportunity to write an awful book. Just think of all the times you wished you had written a novel. Like that time you were trying to impress that artsy girl in your English class. Or when you’re at a table of 20-something-year-olds and the major difference between you and them is a college (or high school) diploma. A book trumps anything you could possibly fathom.
“Oh, you graduated fromPrinceton? I’m writing my second novel. Do you want my autograph now or later?”
In the words of the great Brian Fantana, “60 percent of the time, it works every time.”
As I look back on that month, I can think of no better way to have spent it than sitting in front of my laptop for hours on end constantly trying to write 1,667 words per day. There was a period of four days where I had given up. Then, on Thanksgiving, I decided I had spent too much time and effort to stop, so I wrote 7,000 words on that one day and I reached 50,000 a mere 13 minutes before the deadline on the 30th. Who doesn’t want to spend a month like that?
For those of you who are intrigued, which I assume is everyone, I have just a few more words to share.
If you’re planning on joining the elite group of people that like to be called authors, I want to tell you congratulations. You’ve already made it past the hardest part, convincing yourself to write a novel.
Don’t second-guess yourself, you’re totally making the right decision. As far as advice goes, I have only a few suggestions.
Start writing. Start writing a lot.
For people who are going to do this, you’ll want to know your capabilities as a writer going into it, what your strong and weak points are, and how you’ll plan to live a normal life along with this (you won’t).
Get used to late nights and early mornings, and get used to your eyes hurting from large amounts of visible light beaming into your face. I suggest lowering the brightness on the device you write it on. I’m planning on using my iPad, which could be disastrous.
Be ready to take risks, big risks. Your novel could be really good or really bad based on this one criterion, and more often that not, risks make your novel better because the plot becomes more interesting.
And finally, the very best advice I can give you for writing a novel is to start liking the taste of coffee. If you don’t, well, there’s always mocha.
