Tag: camp NaNoWriMo

Photo of a book titled "Project Quest Book 1: The Prince" in front of a bookshelf

So You Wrote A Book

Maggie2 Comments

Here’s what you do next:

You smile. Maybe cry a little, either from relief or joy, or maybe both. You don’t scream even though you want to, because it’s 1:00 in the morning and you don’t want your neighbors to think you’re getting murdered.

You tell the only other person who’s crazy enough to be awake at this hour on a Sunday night (Monday morning?).

You export your document and save it to the cloud because your laptop had a near-death experience twenty minutes ago as you were writing the last three lines and you nearly broke down in tears. (Thank goodness for autosave). You don’t want to repeat that.

You tweet about the book.

And you go to bed.

Screenshot of a tweet that reads: "1.5 years and 93,000 words later, I finally have a completed draft of the first book of my fantasy project. I can't believe it. I need to go to bed now."
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A blank notebook page sits on a desk. a #2 pencil sits on top of the page.

Why NaNoWriMo Isn’t Always a Good Idea

Maggie2 Comments

I have a confession to make: I didn’t participate in NaNoWriMo this year. I set it as one of my goals earlier this year, but as November grew closer, I realized that it wasn’t going to work out this year. I had a lot going on in terms of school and my personal life, and adding 50,000 words on top of that looked more like torture than a fun challenge.

When November 1 came and I saw many of my friends announcing their intentions to participate in NaNoWriMo, I couldn’t help feeling a little guilty. After all, I had told myself I would do it, and I’d gone back on that commitment. As the month wore on though, I got over my self-deprecation and realized that I actually enjoyed not being a part of NaNoWriMo this year.

That might sound like heresy to the writing community, but it’s the truth. I’m thankful that Past Maggie made the decision to pass on NaNoWriMo 2018. Don’t get me wrong, there are a lot of good things that can come out of NaNoWriMo – self-discipline, connections with other writers, and a completed draft, to name a few. Those things come with sacrifices, however, and I’m of the mind that sometimes those sacrifices aren’t worth it.

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