Take Stock of Where You Are

NaNoWriMo isn’t always the best use of a writer’s time. If you’re in the middle of a revision, and going along at a good clip, stopping to work on something new could kill the momentum you’ve built. But if you are in a place to start something new, set a goal now to get your other writing commitments out of the way by November 1. That way, you’ll have a clean slate–or desk–and be ready to write.

Start by making a list of all the writerly things you would love to have out of the way to be in your ideal drafting head-space. This can include things outside of just finishing another book. Are you guest-posting in the next few months? Get those drafts done and out the door. Did you plan on submitting a short story to a literary magazine? Hit “Send!” Drafting takes a certain type of creative energy. Make sure all yours is stored up for your shiny new idea.

Set Up Your Space for Ideal Focus

I recently read Marie Kondo’s The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, a book that focuses on discarding everything that doesn’t “Spark joy” in your living space.  Kondo’s philosophy is that we should set up our homes only with things we absolutely love, and that help us spend time the way we want. Half my clothes, shoes and even books went out the door. So did my desk. It got me thinking about what is the perfect writing space for me, and coming up with creative ideas to achieve it.

Do you have an inspiration board for your books? Do you like having a candle burning while you write? Do you prefer a de-cluttered desk, but stuff has piled up? Start working on the board, stock up on candles, and tackle that clutter.Take stock of your writing space now, so that come November 1, it’s ready for you to work. First up on my list? Find a new desk. 

Start Exploring Your World

The blank page is scary. It can be less scary if you’re more sure of your world, characters and story. Whether you’re a plotter or a pantser, having a strong sense of your story before you start can help stave off writer’s block. Take an afternoon to get to know your characters. There are tons of exercises out there to help writers think more deeply about them. Take a deep-dive into backstory, and write about the myths, legends and history of your world. Free-write from the POV of a secondary character. Or, if you’re so inclined, try writing a loose outline. These types of exercises can help a writer feel more confident approaching the blank page on November 1.

Form Habits Now

Whether you write every day or only when the mood strikes you, NaNoWriMo requires a certain level of focus and time. One of the best ways to ensure that, come November 1, you’re ready to write over a thousand words a day is to start developing those awesome writerly habits now. I know if I haven’t written in a few weeks, getting back into the habit of waking up at 6am and somehow remaining focused for an hour and a half takes me a few weeks.

What is your ideal writing schedule? And how can you take the next two months to get yourself into it? Are there any habits that you need to develop to get back in the game? Whether it’s going to bed earlier, or setting up your coffee pot for the morning, asking these questions–and coming up with a plan now–will help tremendously when you’re beginning to draft.

There are so many ways to prep for the craziness of NaNoWriMo. Do you have any tips or tricks? Let me know on social media, or in the comments!

The post Participating in NaNoWriMo? Start Planning Now! appeared first on DIY MFA.

Some #NaNoWriMo participants are feeling particularly confident right now. Maybe they spent the last few months plotting. Maybe they’re excited about pansting their next work. Regardless of the reason for this confidence, there’s always room for a little challenge.

Characters need to be developed, plots need to be ironed out, subplots need to be created, and timelines need to be tightened. Our scenes need to be so vivid in our minds that we can paint pictures, showing even the most minute of details. Writing programs, sticky notes, and worksheets are all among the tools available to us, but what happens when need to test our own knowledge of our worlds? How can we dig deeper, and try to push beyond the boundaries of our chained imaginations?

Of course, I’m sure you know, flash fiction is the answer.

Here are three flash fiction exercises to help you get #NaNoWriMo ready in a few hours:

Character Development

You may be pretty sure you know your main characters. You know which actors would play them in movies, you know their favorite songs, strengths, weaknesses, and secrets. Most of your focus has been on the roles they play in helping your plot to unfold, so you’re confident about that. What if you scrambled the roles? What if character A now has character C’s problem? What would she do? How would character B sold character A’s problem. Put your characters in the situations of other characters. This will not only help you to explore your characters more deeply, but ensures that your plot is not standing on its own, being unfolded by nameless, faceless characters. Every act is being carried out by a specific character, and those actions are particular to the actors, based on their backgrounds, personalities, and desires rather than your own wishes. Give each main character 750 words to fight their way out of other characters’ situations.

Setting Creation

Setting are important in novels. We often tend to focus on one sense – sight. Start to explore other sensory details of the primary settings in your novel. Even in appearance, we often overlook things that are not as obvious as furniture. To help you do this, invite a group of experts into your setting, and have them make observations. A housekeeper may notice cobwebs in areas less occupied. A crime scene investigator can pick up on clues your characters don’t know they left behind. What if a contract killer can spend a few minutes in a setting, and be able to plan the perfect, undetectable crime? Would an antique shop owner uncover family secrets? Choose three main settings and give your chosen experts fifteen minutes to make observations. Then, in 1000 words of dialogue only, write their roundtable discussion.

Scene Switching

Whether you have fully planned scenes or a loose idea of what they’ll look like, it can be helpful (and fun!) to make little changes, move them around, and explore the effects of deleting them. Identify the scene that makes your novel possible. It’s the one that changes things and forces your main character to take a particular action. Write three 500 word replacements for the next scene in the event that (in the pivotal scene):

1. The opposite happens
2. Someone intervenes and changes the course
3. The scene does not exist

No matter how ready we are to write, we can always prepare more. It can be fun to explore, challenge ourselves, and learn as we go. Even as creators, we have a lot to learn about the stories of our own making.

NaNoWriMo is a time to enjoy every minute of our writing. We can revel in the community feel of what is usually a solitary experience. It’s a lot easier to be in the moment and engage other participants when we’re prepared, well-equipped with intimate knowledge of our novels to-be. Have fun with the exercises, and feel free to tweak them to suit your needs. It’s all about making it work for you and your novel.

………………………………..

Alicia Audrey is a writer, editor, blogger and social and political commentator living and working in Nassau, Bahamas. She enjoys writing flash fiction, and is currently working on a women’s fiction novel entitled The Whispering Willow. She prides herself on keeping the local post office open by sending far too many penpal letters and packages to friends and strangers alike on a weekly basis. Her favourite things include journals, tea, cupcakes, sarcasm, challenges, and autumn. She tweets her musings to everyone, but no one in particular, as @_AliciaAudrey.

The post Flash Fiction Exercises for #NaNoWriMo Prep appeared first on DIY MFA.

1) A Push to Write (Or Finish) Your Book

This one is a bit obvious, but it’s worth repeating. It’s why NaNoWriMo has taken off the way it has. Because there’s never enough time and there’s often not enough motivation, but in November, writers set that aside, knuckle down, and write. Whether you’re starting something completely new, or needing the last push to finish the draft you’ve been working on all year, NaNoWriMo is a great kick in the pants to get words on the page.

2) An Excuse to Tackle a Difficult Goal

Is there an area of your writing life you avoid like the plague? Maybe it’s social media, or drafting, or finally fixing the world-building problems in your trunk novel. NaNoWriMo is the perfect time to slay the beast. It’s only one month–anyone can work on something for a month–and with all the built-in support from other writers, you won’t be tackling anything alone!

3) A Moment to Prepare for the New Year

Here at DIY MFA, we’re big fans of goal-setting. The New Year is always a great time to take stock of where you are in your writing, and where you want to be in a year. But reflecting only one day a year will probably not yield the best results. NaNoWriMo is a perfect time to look around, see where you were, and where you want to be, so you can start forming realistic, but ambitious goals for this year and beyond.

4) A Chance to Develop a New Habit

Habits are powerful, and can have a positive impact on our writing lives. Thirty days is the perfect amount of time to develop a new one. If you want to set a habit of writing every day, but 50,000 words is just unfeasible, set a goal that is. This will look different for different writers. Maybe you can commit to 1,000 words a day–so, 30,000 total. Or 500, for 15,000 words total. Maybe you want to journal every day, write a piece of flash fiction, or write with the internet turned off for an hour daily. Be creative! Think about the writer you want to be, and see what you can change to make that dream a reality today.

5) A Reminder that You’re Not Alone

Writing is a lonely endeavor, but it doesn’t have to be. The internet is always a great place to find writing buddies, but in November, with thousands of writers setting aside time for NaNoWriMo, the place is abuzz. Whether you find buddies for writing sprints on Twitter, or in the forums on NaNoWriMo’s official site, you can count on there being other writers in the same sleep-deprived, caffeine-buzzed state you are!

Bess Cozby writes epic stories in expansive worlds from her tiny apartment in New York City. By day, she’s an Editor at Tor Books, and Web Editor for DIY MFA. Her work is represented by Brooks Sherman of the Bent Agency. Tweet her at @besscozby, contact her at bess@diymfa.com, or visit her website at www.besscozby.com.

The post #5OnFri: Five Benefits of Aiming High During NaNoWriMo appeared first on DIY MFA.

The weeks leading up to November 1st were filled with frantic activity. I tried to plot. I tried to plan. I tried to follow every piece of advice they dished out. I read every motivational email they sent my way. I joined the forums and found other newbies just as scared and eager as I was. 

Then November 1st rolled around, and I happily sat down at the computer to start writing. 

Nothing happened.

Day 2, I fumbled a few words on the screen, then deleted them. 

Day 3, 4 and 5 passed by in a blur. 

Day 6 I started to panic. I managed to write a few pages of dribble. It was horrible. I’m not even sure there were complete sentences. I shared my angst with people on the forums, and that’s when I learned the first truth of a Writing Challenge: 

1) It’s not meant to be beautiful

It’s meant to get your butt in the chair, and your fingers moving. I heard “give yourself permission to suck” a lot in those first few days.

I mastered that part perfectly.

The next seven days sped by. I piled on more words, but I was so far behind the goal that it seemed like I’d never get to the end. I’d already resigned myself to not finishing, which made it very difficult to put any words down at all. “Why bother?” crossed my mind several times. If I couldn’t reach the goal, why even try?

That’s when another motivational email flittered across my screen, carrying with it another truth of a Writing Challenge: 

2) You Can’t Edit a Blank page

A writer is not someone who sits and stares at a blank page. A writer is someone who writes. No matter what mood she’s in or how horrible that first draft is. No matter that there’s a holiday coming up, or that she worked 16 hours that day and have seventeen kids, six dogs and a raccoon to care for. Writers write. A writing challenge helps you focus on the one task that ensures your writing career: putting words on the page.

It became my personal mission to make 50k and join those on the other side of the finish line, even if I had to toss all the words on December 1st. I rearranged my expectations. I would not have a finished novel at the end of 30 days. But what I would have is something to edit, the experience of having written, and the companionship of others trying to accomplish the same thing. 

As my fingers sped over the keyboard, the third truth arrived: 

3) The More You Write, the Better You’ll Become

Somewhere in the middle of the night around November 27th, after several rounds of caffeine, too much turkey and far too little sleep, I met my main character Tarian. I’d been pushing her like a puppet through events and plot points for 27 days. She’d fought me most of the way, which I didn’t understand until I was in the middle of midnight marathon. She told me: “This is not who I am. I would never do things this way. I’d do them that way.”  I closed my eyes and thought; “Let her speak. What’s the worst that could happen?” I followed her along a far different path from the one I’d planned. 

She showed me who she was that night, and finding her story and my voice. 15k words later, I crossed the finish line. November 29th. 11:00 pm. I’d won the challenge. More than that, I’d won the companionship of a main character who would carry my entire series. I learned how to let her voice shine. And I learned how to make a deadline. 

So what is a Writing Challenge?

It’s a chance to find your voice, your story, your character, your muse, and yourself. At the very least, it’s a chance to meet other writers all trying to do the same thing. You’re not alone. It’s comforting to know, at 2:00 am when you’re in a caffeine induced haze, that someone else is out there feeling your pain. 

My first novel, Stronger Than Magic, was born during my first writing challenge. The final story is nothing like that first vomit draft written in the dead of night. But I wouldn’t have a published a novel at all, much less a series, if I hadn’t tried the challenge. I’d probably still be staring at a blank screen. I figure Tarian’s pretty happy I didn’t give up.

If you’re looking for a writing challenge for the summer, stay tuned. DIY MFA has something in the works that you’re going to LOVE.

Conquer the Craft in 29 Days!

Speaking of  challenges, check out Conquer the Craft in 29 Days (#CTC29).

It’s a prompt-a-day challenge designed to help you write more, write better, write smarter.
There’s still time to join, but it’s happening now so hurry and sign up. Click the link for more info.

Melinda VanLone serves as DIY MFA’s official shutterbug. Melinda earned an MA in publishing from Syracuse University, which she applied toward years as a graphic artist/designer, a skill she uses today at www.bookcovercorner.com.

In addition to book cover design and photography, Melinda writes urban fantasy and blogs on her website melindavan.com. As an air force brat, she’s lived briefly in places all across the country, but currently resides in Rockville, MD with her wonderfully supportive husband and furbaby. When she’s not playing with imaginary friends in her fantasy worlds you can find her playing World of Warcraft, wandering through the streets with her camera, or hovered over coffee in Starbucks.

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