23 October 2009

National Novel Writing Month 2009



November is National Novel Writing Month or NaNoWriMo.  This will be my first year as a participant and I’m excited, because everyone else is excited and I don’t know why yet, but I can’t wait to find out.  Here’s the website for details: http://www.nanowrimo.org/
“Valuing enthusiasm and perseverance over painstaking craft, NaNoWriMo is a novel-writing program for everyone who has thought fleetingly about writing a novel but has been scared away by the time and effort involved.”
The objective is to write a 175 page novel or 50,000 words between November 1rst and November 30th.  They emphasize quantity over quality in the spirit of sheer fun.  In 2008, NaNoWriMo had 119,301 participants and 21,683 winners.  A little background:
Founded by: Freelance writer Chris Baty and 20 other overcaffeinated yahoos in 1999.
Now run by: The Office of Letters and Light, an august 501(c)(3) nonprofit based in Oakland.
In my opinion, over-caffeination is genius, so NaNoWriMo must be, too.  They have a Young Writer’s program and on November 22 a Write-a-thon Fundraiser in San Francisco.  It’s a “night of writing dangerously”…
Many reasons exist for a writer to participate, but I’m asking myself, “Do I need a reason?” 



6 comments:

  1. You beat me to the punch! I'm participating this year and have participated for several years now. I LOVE NaNo! I'm adding you on NaNo. I'm Mochan42. =) See you there!

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  2. Yay! Now I'm totally committed....AAAAAhh!!! This going to be great!

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  3. I'm participating too. Scared to death, haven't registered yet, but I'm doing it.

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  4. I'm scared too! But we must be brave and we must not edit and it will all be sloppy goodness.

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  5. Ok, it's official. I signed up today.

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