For those of us who don't know, "NaNoWriMo" stands for "National Novel Writing Month" - where aspiring authors take the entire month of November to attempt to finish the first draft of a brand new novel (or 50,000 words of it, whatever works better for what you're doing). The challenge itself is more symbolic, an excuse to kick authors into gear and take seriously their aspirations to one day publish a book.
I myself am participating this year, with my first earnest attempt at authorship beyond fifth-grade fanfiction and roleplay-inspired short stories. My novel is going to be a fantasy inspired by Ocean's Eleven and other heist flicks, with the following premise: A group of down-on-their-luck outcasts and outlaws come together for a desperate heist, but stumble upon a conspiracy of dark forces that seek to imperil the world, and must transform themselves from criminals to champions.
My current word count is honestly quite pitiful, sitting somewhere at around 1,000 words of compulsively rewritten prologue, as the process of writing it has transformed the story several times over and every transformation means I'm kinda starting from scratch because I am a dumb idiot-brained typewriter-monkey. I've already come to terms with the fact that I've probably failed the challenge, but I'm still going to try my best! So instead I started spending more of my writing time on an actual outline for the story instead of just winging it.
And speaking of outlines, that's where I'd add my little advice nugget! It's geared towards writing compelling screenplays, but I recommend at least skimming a book called "The Anatomy of Story," by John Truby. You can find PDFs online, and I've never seen so many insightful things packed so densely into writing. It's what I've been following to help me figure out the outline for my story, and it's genuinely transformative. One of my favorite pieces of advice from the book is that you should always aspire to write a story that will change your life.
That's where I'm at! Is anyone else participating this year? What progress do you have to share? Do you think my story idea is bad and lame and I should give up on my dreams? I want to hear everything!'The Anatomy of Story,' by John Truby wrote:You might say, "I'd love to write a story that changes my life, but how do I know it will change my life before I've written it?" Simple: do some self-exploration, something most writers, incredibly enough, never do.