Writing November

A lot of folks have been asking me if I’m participating in National Novel Writing Month this year, so I thought I would answer here. No, but not for lack of interest or desire. I just couldn’t get my shit together yet in time, and there are too many other considerations on my time to really throw myself at a project like that. I have the perfect story for it, even — but I’ll have to write it a bit more slowly through traditional means.

That doesn’t mean I’ll be idle, though! I’ll be trying (at last) to get up to a regular posting schedule here so that people know to expect fresh entries on storytelling, movie reviews and original fiction three times a week. I’m working on a short story commission that will hopefully ready to show on-line by the end of the year. The Pathfinder game is returning from a small hiatus, and I’m keen to continue the story I’ve been telling with my group there. There’s also preparing for a few panels I’ll be in for Further Confusion 2014 and continuing work on editing for a zine. A rabbit’s work is never done, and that’s generally the way I like it.

I’m excited about everything that I have on my plate; the only thing I lack is the discipline to make sure it gets done on time. But that’s not a new observation, so suffice it to say that trying to develop a working process that will help me do everything I want to do is continually in the works. I’m learning a lot of tricks as I go, and forcing myself to accept my own personal flaws goes a long way towards working through them. My available energy supply is strongest in the morning and dwindles steadily to nothing by late at night, so finding ways to accommodate that is something I’m keenly interested in.

But enough about me: I have a number of friends who’ll be participating in NaNoWriMo and I wanted to give a shout-out to them. It’s really not easy to do it, but I love that there’s a huge community that’s sprouted up as a celebration of writing, and particularly pushing yourself to do the thing you’ve always wanted to do but haven’t for whatever reason. I’m not sure how many novels written during this month actually go anywhere, but creating that raw lump of clay you can use to form something beautiful is one of the most difficult parts of the process. Anything that encourages you to stick through that is worthwhile.

My friend Sylvan Scott has churned out a novel for his “Fandom” series every November for the past four or five years, and he’s at it again with the latest story, “Fen”. I don’t think any of those stories are up online (though I’m sure he’ll correct me if I’m wrong), but you can visit his Smashwords page here. There are a lot of neat stories there, many of them for free!

Twitter friend @DarkEnd is a participant this year, writing a story called “Pandemonium”. I don’t think there are samples online as of yet, but you can track his progress here if you’re interested. Go and cheer him on!

If you’re participating in NaNoWriMo this year, know that you have a cheerleader in me. It’s very difficult and it takes discipline to pull it off; even if you don’t end up making your goal, the decision to strive for it leaves you in a better place than you were when you started. Good luck out there! While I won’t be writing my own novel, I plan on logging a number of hours behind my writing desk in solidarity.