it's creeping closer...!

No, not Halloween (but oh how I miss trick-or-treating! I'll have to buy several bags of candy for myself because, I mean, who doesn't secretly do that??).

NaNoWriMo is almost upon us. I'm assuming approximately 99.654% of the people (or robots? cyborgs?) reading this already know what NaNoWriMo is. But if you're part of that 00.346%, fear not! NaNoWriMo stands for National Novel Writing Month and occurs in November. For the entire month crazy-pants people attempt to write a novel (or at least 50,000 words). Pretty straightforward, no?

Last year was the first time I participated and I have to say, it was so insane and so much fun! I'm so glad I did it. Here's why: it actually got me to finish a novel. For the first time. I had had several in the works, but before NaNoWriMo I hadn't ever completed a MS (and by completed I only mean the first/rough draft). Now, almost a year later, I've finished one... two... three... four?? I think? novels. Not all of them I went on to revise and polish, but still, that's around 200,000 words I've written since last year -- 200,000 words that have made me a better writer.

NaNoWriMo jump-started my desire to write, and to write a lot. I found out I was capable of completing something, and writing a couple thousand words a day became almost second nature -- really, it made the 500 words I previously struggled to get to every couple days seem like nothing.

If you haven't tried NaNoWriMo, I strongly recommend giving it a shot.

For those of you who have, what's your fave thing about it?

Mine? Probably the all-nighters I pulled, as well as seeing the progression of other writers' novels. Their steadily increasing word counts motivated me to keep writing, writing, writing.

Hmm... now I'm craving Kit Kats.

Have a lovely day, everyone!

- k.