Category Archives: NaNoWriMo

The sounds of my NaNoWriMo

Long-time readers know I love having music while I write. Sometimes it’s just background noise, but often it’s a specific set of songs, and in the case of whole books (like my story collection or two of my novel projects), it’s full-blown soundtracks, with each song selected and organized to reflect what’s going on inContinue reading “The sounds of my NaNoWriMo”

A Writer’s Notebook: NaNoWriMo 2011, week 1

I’m on day four of National Novel Writing Month. And it’s been a good but strange few days, because while I have a table of contents already and a relatively solid idea of what I’m writing about — the apocalypse, and, now that I’ve done some quick-and-dirty background research and settled some things in my head,Continue reading “A Writer’s Notebook: NaNoWriMo 2011, week 1”

Photo blog 69

As I did last year, I’m using November’s photo blog posts to record some mood-setting pictures for my NaNoWriMo project. This year: the apocalypse, which involves a lot of ash. Hence these doctored, ashed-up photos of fog in Portland. (Today was eerily — and almost undrivably — foggy as well, so it felt like good timingContinue reading “Photo blog 69”

More notes on my NaNoWriMo table of contents

On Monday, I was explaining the concept of NaNoWriMo to my students, and they asked what I was writing. So I told them about my book idea and the “table of contents” I’d come up with, and one student asked me, “How do you write from a title?” But before I could answer, another studentContinue reading “More notes on my NaNoWriMo table of contents”

NaNoWriMo in a comfortable sweater

I’m starting NaNoWriMo today, so I figure I ought to get comfortable. I have a lot of writing ahead of me. This is a sweater my mother-in-law gave me a few years ago. At the time, I was living in Wisconsin and renting a duplex from a wonderful couple who knew I taught at theContinue reading “NaNoWriMo in a comfortable sweater”

A Writer’s Notebook: NaNoWriMo table of contents

In just a few days, National Novel Writing Month will begin. So of course I’m gearing up. I have a lot of explaining to do about what you’ll see on the “notebook page” below, but I don’t want to front-load all this. Better just to give you the list, and then I’ll explain everything below. ToContinue reading “A Writer’s Notebook: NaNoWriMo table of contents”

Writing the year away: My year in words and numbers

This year has been the first full calendar year that I’ve spent focused exclusively on writing. I’ve actually been doing this since summer 2009, and though I’ll still be exclusively writing in spring 2011, I’m anxious to get back into the classroom (I miss students and the intellectual discourse of academia!). But in terms ofContinue reading “Writing the year away: My year in words and numbers”

NaNoWriMo Conclusion

Well, it’s official:  I’ve “won” NaNoWriMo,” with a final word count of 51,879 words.  Fewer than last year, but many more to come if I expect to finish the story itself.  Still, I’m glad to be finished with this frenzied marathon, because the whole experience has, as per last year, energized my writing, and I’mContinue reading “NaNoWriMo Conclusion”

A Writer’s Notebook: NaNoWriMo update #4

So, as promised, I’ve been tinkering a bit with the book since I returned from vacation, even adding some new scenes, but I haven’t updated the word count because most of the new text is still in my voice recorder and most of the changes have been internal, meaning that part of the word countContinue reading “A Writer’s Notebook: NaNoWriMo update #4”