Nan Oh Rhyme Oh

It’s that time of year, again. The fall leaves changing, the air is getting colder (I think I covered most of this in my last post). But most of all, we’re quickly approaching November. And that means: NaNoWriMo.

For those unfamiliar, NaNoWriMo is National Novel Writing Month. The time of year where thousands of people around the world simultaneously attempt to write a 50,000 word novel between November 1st and November 30th. It’s a truly tough row to hoe, requiring at minimum 1,667 words produced to page per day in order to manage the feat. I haven’t done it myself since 2007, when I wrote a truly hideous novel that I immediately tucked away in a drawer and promptly forgot.

But, the point is, I WROTE A NOVEL. I can say that even now, six years later, as I wind up the various strings and intricate mechanisms of thought in an attempt to try, try again to accomplish such a task.

This time, however, I won’t be alone. This NaNo effort was actually sparked by my wonderful wife, who realized they had a NaNoWriMo Young Writer’s program, where you can sign up as educators and watch over your classroom. We have setup just such a thing, where our two boys shall attempt their own novels (with appropriately smaller word count goals). It should be interesting to watch them progress through a month of daily writing. I’m placing bets on when each of them decides to give up on the effort (will they even make it to Thanksgiving? One can only hope….)

You can watch my own progress through the month over here (I’ll probably also be posting quite frequently on my personal Facebook and Twitter accounts).

As an added bonus, my wife – being a goddess of Pinterest – has created an inspirational NaNoWriMo board, which I’ll be (occasionally) contributing to. It’s already got a load of great writing tips and advice in handy inforgraphic format. I’m already feeling sufficiently INSPIRED.

So, over the next few days, we’ll be starting to assemble outlines, conceptualize ideas, plot out scenarios, sketch some characters, and dress a few settings. All in preparation for the start of putting words to page first thing November 1st.

It’s time to drag something out of nothing. It’s time for NaNoWriMo 2013.