NaNoWriMo 2011- An Update

You may have noticed it. I did too. I hadn’t realized that I haven’t blogged for a week now. The reason is obvious. It is that time of the year! I have been totally engrossed in the National Novel Writing Month.  NaNoWriMo 2011 is as exciting as previous years for me. I have got off  a bright start. In the first five days, I have completed 14, 500 words of my novel. I aim to make it 3 in 3 , having successfully completed NaNoWriMo in the first two years of my participation in 2009 and 2010. My debut novel, a psychological thrilled titled “ It Can’t Be You” , published in November 2010, actually came out from my debut attempt at NaNoWriMo in 2009.

I find it best to use a combination of Microsoft Word and Dark Room to do my writing. Like most people these days, I prefer to key in my text directly. I rarely use pen and paper in my writing. I find myself reaching for the pen and paper only to make notes and plan something. I scribble a lot during my writing as new ideas strike me. Sometimes I need to make notes to myself to check a fact or two to make sure there are no inconsistencies in what I write.

The forums in the NaNoWriMo site also prove to be an enormous help. There are so many like-minded people out there. It’s wonderful to share experiences and learn from others. I am not sure how many people are participating this year but I do recall that some 200,000 from all over the world took part last year.

The first few days and the last few days of NaNoWriMo are relatively easy as in the beginning, you are highly charged and at the end you are determined to finish. It’s the middle period that you need to watch out for. It can be frustrating to keep plugging on hitting an average of 1666 words per days. Whenever I can, I try to exceed the daily target so that I build cushion for myself, knowing that not everyday is equally productive. On some days, the flow is very strong while on others you may struggle to get to even 1000 words.

I need to sign off and get back to my writing.