Author Toolbox Blog Hop – My NaNoWriMo Prep

This post was written specifically for the #AuthorToolboxBlogHop.

With the way this year seems to be going, November is going to be just around the corner and bringing with it the annual challenge of National Novel Writing Month. This year I would really like to make a better showing so I’m already beginning to think about how best to prepare myself for the task.

On a small side note, it was mainly due to our hostess, Raimey Gallant, that got me to make my first attempt at NaNoWriMo. That in turn led to to a social media hop for some participants which, in time, developed into #AuthorToolboxBlogHop.

The first thing I’ve done is come up with a checklist of things for me to do between now and Nov 1st.

1. Decide on a project.
2. Outline project.
3. Set checkpoints.
4. Get back into writing daily.

Okay, the first one was easy since I still have to make some significant progress on House in Exile. The second one is a little trickier. I’ve tried to build an outline before with (very) limited success,. I’m not sure if it’s a mental block on my part or if I’ve just been going about it in the wrong way but I feel like it’s something I need to do. Any advice will be welcomed.

As for what I mean by checkpoints, I think in the past I’ve allowed myself to get hung up on the daily word count and then felt overwhelmed when I look at how behind I am. So this time, instead of worrying about the daily, I’m going to focus on where I need to be at each weekend in November.

Given that I work 7am to 6pm (when you include the commute) Monday to Friday, the weekends are where I’ll have that much more time available to write. Plus if I make it the Saturday, rather than the Sunday, not only will that fall square with the last day of the month, it will given me the Sundays to try and make up any short falls.

Here’s what I estimate the checkpoints will be:

• 1st Sat (2nd) – 3,334
• 2nd Sat (9th) – 15,003
• 3rd Sat (16th) – 26,672
• 4th Sat (23rd) – 38,341
• 5th Sat (30th) – 50,010

Finally, I really need to get back to writing daily. After all, I can’t really expect to be able to go from 0 to 60 (or 1,667, as the case may be) just like that.

There are probably other preparations I should be making that may occur to me later but I’ve already overdue with this post so I’m going to leave things here for now. For those of you who also intend taking part in NaNoWriMo, how are you getting yourselves ready?

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