NaNoWriMo and the Birth of My RomCom Novel

If you hang with the cool kids, you've probably heard the term NaNoWriMo. It stands for National Novel Writing Month. The idea is to excrete 50 thousand words of a novel in 30 days (yep, it's one of those months.)

It's a quantity over quality play. Every word counts. Don't delete! Keep going!! And whatever you do, do not use contractions! Personally, I like to include notes to myself as I go, possibly because those words count too. I put the notes in brackets so they're easy to search for later.

For example: [Add super funny witty banter here] [Figure out a good name for his company] [Add sensory notes] [I will bet that it is about time to do some light colored laundry but I might be out of detergent] [Are we there yet?]

All evidence to the contrary, I am a perfectionist by nature. I would love to obsess over every scribble, flipping the pages of the Internet until I find the exact right word. Like while writing that last sentence, I thought "I'll bet there's a foreign phrase that says that fancier," and then my ADHD kicked in and soon I was curled up in my Snuggie with my Walkman on, listening to my Beginner French cassette tapes. I mean, my mom's cassette tapes. Obvi. And all writing would have to wait.

But two years ago, I buckled up and took NaNoWriMo for a ride. Halfway through the month, I was convinced that NaNoWriMo stood for Nah, I'm Not a Writer Month. Then at midnight on November 30, I had over fifty-two thousand words of my novel and something vaguely resembling a first draft. I was a believer. I proudly printed my novel, packaged it up with some of those Forever stamps I'd been saving since 2007, and mailed it to Santa, proof that I was, in fact, a very good girl.

About a week later, I reread it. Holy moly, it was bad. Like, really, really, really bad. BUT… I'd completed the first draft. I discovered the first seven chapters were completely unnecessary. Not just unnecessary, excruciatingly boring. CUT! And because I had written those chapters at warp speed, I didn't feel the throat punch that usually comes after cutting my mot justes. More reading, more cuts. More additions. More changes.

As I'd written that draft, I'd uncovered the story arc and the setting. It needed work, but the skeleton of a story was there. My characters were also taking form, but I didn't know much about them. So, I spent most of the next year on character development. I wanted to know my side characters as well as I knew my main characters. I wanted to figure out how they'd all met and what they really thought about each other. By the time the next NaNoWriMo rolled around, I was bursting to take another swat at that story. And I did. And after mailing it off to Santa, I took another break. Then I reread it. Wow. It was still really, really bad. BUT! The characters were kindof awesome. And the story was taking shape. And I didn't get coal in my stocking. Win, win, win!

I'm approaching this NaNoWriMo differently. I know the story and my now beloved friends well. I've created different goals for myself, filling in gaps and making revisions. And I now have a bigger goal...

I will have my novel written by the end of the summer 2024.

The story will still need edits and may undergo some significant changes when outside readers take a peek, but my friends and I will be ready. And as the great Mork from Ork used to say (back when mom was listening to those cassette tapes) NaNo NaNo!

How about you? Have you ever participated in NaNoWriMo? If so, what was your experience? If not, why not? Let me know below!