28 October 2008

It's not exactly NaNoWriMo

NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month, for the uninitiated) begins on Saturday. For the third or fourth year in a row now, I am adamantly not participating.

Writing 50,000 words in a month sounds like complete torture and not helpful at all with where she is in this process.

I am however, adapting this literary "holiday" to suit my own devices. Word Nerd is celebrating NaNoEdMo -- National Novel Editing Month.

She finished writing the WIP sometime last winter (February, perhaps?) And now it's almost November and she's still slogging through revisions. She could rattle off excuses as to why, but none of them are really valid save for the fact that she says she doesn't like editing.

Truth is, when the editing is going well, when the book is getting better, the editing part is just fine too. So, starting the celebration early, Word Nerd's worked on the book four days in a row and has a schedule for keeping on track until she's completed the revisions on this sucker.

Word Nerd wants to throw open her NaNoEdMo celebration to anyone else who needs to revise rather than write. Anyone?

6 comments:

Belinda Kroll, YA Victorian Romance said...

I have limited time, but I'm also working on edits, and that's my plan for November. My goal is to have the second draft... drafted... by December 16. Don't know why I chose that particular date.

Unknown said...

I personally am participating in NaNo, but I do know of another author who is using November to edit a previous work. WordStrumpet will be editing a novel she wrote a couple of years ago while doing NaNo.

Best of luck on your editing.

Bethany K. Warner said...

Belinda -- good luck on that second draft!

CJ -- hats off to you for doing NaNo... best wishes for something resembling a plot!

Kathie said...

Would love to do NaNo but just can't get it to fit into my schedule. I do like the NaNoEdMo idea though. I have over the years written several novels. Homeschooling 5 children, being a full-time wife, mom, and missionary left me with little time to edit, much less seek publication. Now, however, the 5 are gone and I would love to get some of my stories reworked and edited.
Blessings from Costa Rica

Krista said...

Coincidentally, I just learned about NaNoWriMo about 10 days ago. Having begun my first official "work" on Tuesday, I'm celebrating this as NaNFWriMo to jump start a NonFiction Christian Inspirational piece. If you can spin it to your needs, then I take that as permission to do so myself!

Emily said...

I hang on and do NaNo for about fifteen days and then exhaustion and disgust take me over and I'm done. And yet, every year I do it. Torture, why yes, yes it is. But I think writers like torturing ourselves, just a little anyway.