Hello everyone! I hope the beginning of May is treating y’all right!
For those of you who participated in Camp NaNoWriMo in April, I am sure you are all breathing a sigh of relief now that the month is over. Whether you successfully met your goal by the end of the month or not, you have attempted something very spiffy and very impressive, and that is worth celebrating. Any words you wrote are more words than you had before April started.
In addition to being able to set a goal not specifically based on a novel word count, one thing that is kind of nice about Camp NaNoWriMo is that you have the option to adjust your goal for the month at any point during the month. Admittedly, this is only the second year I’ve really attempted Camp NaNo. That said, the last time I did Camp NaNo, I managed to get 50,000 words. It is the standard amount of words for NaNo proper, and I find it a good amount for a first draft. It allows me just enough space to get the main structure of the story down (beginning, middle, and end, if a bit sparse in places). 50,000 is what I normally aim for in a first draft, and I have been able to manage it in the past. So I figured I would stick with that for this year. However, it seems that this year had other plans.
While Camp NaNo and NaNo proper do have a lot of similarities, they give off a bit of a different vibe. Camp feels a bit more laid back. The two events have gotten more similar in certain regards once they were merged onto the same website, NaNoWriMo.org. (Camp NaNo was originally run from a different site, still run by the same organization). That said, there is a certain “magic” to NaNo proper that, for me, seems to be a little harder to come by during either of the Camp sessions in April or July. That might partly be because for the longest time, the only time I really did much writing was during November. NaNo gave me the external deadline, extra motivation, and a spiffy community, though most of my connections with other Wrimos didn’t happen until a couple years ago.
One of the things that was a bit different this year was that this project for Camp NaNo was called “Book 8/Book 9.” This was mostly because I was finishing Book 8 of my series, which I started during NaNo proper in November. Incidentally, my project for that month was “Book 7/Book 8,” though I managed to get the required 50,000 words. I like to joke that after the first year I won, it would be “poor form” to not win the following year (or the year after that, etc). Obviously, there are things in life that can interfere with NaNo, but so far, I’ve managed to keep my streak.
I think the split project within a deadline was part of the reason I was having trouble getting into the same kind of flow I normally find during NaNo. I started the month by trying to continue a first draft that I had started nearly five months prior. That kind of long span of time makes it difficult for me to find a good flow with a story. Things kind of feel more disjointed, which makes it harder for me to get the words on the page. With long drafting times, I tend to find myself overthinking things that don’t need to be overthought in a first draft. I am pleased with the fact that I was able to finish book 8 this month, though. I have actually been looking forward to the final chapters of that one for a while, so it was nice to finally get to draft them.
Finishing one book halfway through Camp NaNo did have a slight disadvantage (compared to single-project months). After finishing book 8, I had to start book 9. Now, I created the outline/timeline for this arc (books 7, 8, and 9) at the same time so I could make sure I had the trajectory of the arc heading where I need it to go within the series overall. However, I drafted that outline/timeline about two years ago. I definitely left some pieces of the outline sparse. Much of that sparseness is intentional due to my nature as a pantser (aka- one who “novels by the seat of their pants”). Other parts of that sparseness, and placement of assorted other elements of the timeline, needed to be updated. At the very least, I needed to accommodate things I had learned while writing the two previous books.
Those developments led to me taking time at different points during the last half of the month to sit down and have a nice, long think about where this book needed to go. I know the end, but there are several parts in the middle that were a bit more nebulous, particularly with regard to their placement in the in-world timeline. To be honest, I am still trying to pin down some spots in the middle. Most of those will probably reveal their proper location while I am writing, but it doesn’t hurt to try to get things approximate beforehand.
Now, between the slow ramp up for the month due to continuing one draft, and the delay caused by some nice, long thinks to start the other draft, my pace was not where it needed to be to get my original goal of 50,000 words for the month. That said, I didn’t officially reduce my goal to 20,000 words until a couple days before the end of April. Between my Slytherin ambition and my past experience with NaNo, including 8,000+ word days at the end of the month (see earlier comment about it being “poor form” to not hit the 50,000), there was certainly still a chance I could make the original goal. Then I had a moment where it occurred to me that I needed to readjust my thinking. Given the previous days of the month, sufficiently high daily word counts seemed unlikely. I still had a couple key elements I needed to ponder, particularly since this book (number 9) is the end of the current arc. As you can see from the chart below, I was decently on track for my adjusted goal of 20,000 words.
Now, I could look at this month and say since I didn’t meet my original goal, this month didn’t go well. However, I have a different view because I know I did accomplish a good bit this month. First, I finished one draft that was giving me trouble due to difficulties with continuing momentum. Second, I started the current book, which I have been looking to for quite some time. Plenty of fun world/character things come up in this book, if I do say so myself. Third, though not specifically writing related, I started a following along with a tutorial for painting Starry Night. I still need to finish that digital painting. It has been fun so far, but it did also take quite a bit of time that could have gone toward writing. As such, I’m including it under my notable accomplishments of the month.
I certainly feel like I have had a productive month, even if the progress isn’t reflected in the number of words written. I am also currently still trying to figure out the best writing schedule for myself. I’m coming up on four months since I changed careers to full-time author. The transition has been overall nice, but it hasn’t been going how I expected it would. I do think I am getting closer to where I need to be with it. This past month helped me identify some of the areas I need to work on.
This month has also been a good reminder to be a bit gentler with myself. I know how much pressure I can put on myself, particularly when it comes to my goals for writing. Goals are useful. Deadlines are useful. Too much pressure and stress are less useful. They make it difficult to achieve those goals and deadlines.
I know that eventually I will get into a routine with my writing (and all the other stuff that goes into self-publishing), and once I do, I will be able to do amazing things. However, I can’t realistically expect all of that to fall into place overnight. I figure as long as I keep moving in the right direction each day, things will find a way to sort themselves out.
So, how did April go for y’all? Did any of y’all participate in Camp NaNo this year? Or did you have other projects (writing or otherwise) that you were working on? I’d love to hear from you in the comments!
Thanks for reading!
~ Theresa
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