National Novel Writing Month! Time for Coffee, Ordering In, and Frantic Word Slinging.

National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo for short) is one of those strange phenomena that illustrates a simple plan creating an extraordinary outcome.

I have seen many blogs and people talking about why NaNoWriMo is ridiculous.

"You should be doing this every month!  Taking only one month out of the year to write is a recipe for failure."

"I need to write slower so I can edit while I write.  NaNo novels are junk."

 "It's too much stress."

"When will these NaNo people get the hell out of my Starbucks?"

All of you can bite me.  I love NaNoWriMo.  And I have invaded "your" Starbucks way before November.

I haven't been quiet about the fact that my first published book, A Love Worth Biting For , was a NaNo novel.  Was it my first ever novel written?  Oh hell no.  My computers are the graveyard to a few doozies. But this was the first time that I sat down and felt the magic of my own words.

NaNoWriMo also helped me do something that I had been struggling to do.  It helped me finish.

You will see me squealing around the Internet about NaNoWriMo.  Why?  Because it gave me a plan, it gave me some tools, and it gave me a community.

The biggest thing I got from NaNoWriMo, was the realization that there were many other people out there at that exact moment, pounding away on the keyboard.  Writing can be a solitary event.  You don't have to talk to anyone, and there are days that the isolation is GRAND.

Getting home from a stressful day job or dealing with someone who you can't stand...yeah...destroying those people in a literary blaze of pain and torture can be a great deal of fun that is best without a witness...er...I mean, audience.

But then there are those times that you've written yourself into a corner.  There are those time that you can't figure out if what you wrote works with the rest of the story.  And there are those times where you just need someone else to tell you, they hit a wall too.  During November, I can take to Twitter and find the #NaNoWriMo or #NaNo hashtags.  I can find people on the NaNo forums, or check in on my writing buddies on the NaNoWriMo website.

The best part?  I get to be encouraging and competitive and drink coffee, and my family puts up with me ignoring them during Thanksgiving.

I am a writer.  So it's time I stop babbling on my blog and do what I love to do.  I am going to watch the words magically appear and create a story from nothing.  The best part?  You can join me.

I have a few bets in play to keep me motivated.  And if I want to win that Starbucks gift card so that I can continue to annoy the piss out of the local business men while I write about public fornication, I better get my butt in gear.

Time for words.  Time for coffee.  Time for NaNoWriMo!


Roxy