Nanowrimo 2016
Nanowrimo is thirty six days away. I don't think any of you have noticed, but I'm internally screaming.
For those of you who don't know, Nanowrimo is a challenge where you set a word count goal for yourself and attempt to make it in a month. There are two sites- the adult Nano, for those thirteen and up, and the YWP Nanowrimo, for those under eighteen. Being under thirteen (I'm soooooo cloooose! gah! Well, at least I'll be able to do Camp this year...) I'm still on YWP and not on the adult Nano. Most adult Nanowrimo participants go for 50k. On YWP you can do whatever word count goal you wish, but the average is 30k.
My first year (2014) I did 30k.
My second year (2015) I did 50k.
This year I am clearly insane, because I'm going to attempt 70k.
Why 70k if I know I'm going to get ridiculously stressed out and crash and burn and die a sad, pitiable death? Because in the last years I've advanced my word count by 20k each time, and 70k has a nice ring to it. You can put on my tombstone "She thought she could write 70k in a month".
Yeah. Anyway. I'm not planning on actually dying, but I do think it's going to be pretty stressful. I decided to try out writing like I will have to this November and I lasted around three days. Yeah. That was partly because I realized how awful my prep is, and panicked and completely abandoned my story for prep. (My prep still is awful.)
HOW TO DO YOUR NANOWRIMO PREP
(because I am cuh-LEARLY an expert. not)
1) Think of an idea.
Thinking of an idea seems like the easiest part, but it actually can be annoyingly difficult. To start off, think of the sort of story you'd like to read. A fantasy or steampunk world? Read a bunch of fantasy and steampunk books. Say you read a story with a bumch of dragons in it and you really like it- your story can have dragons! Bam! You have an idea! Not very fleshed out, but that's why we have step number two...
2) Get some basic ideas.
How do you think having dragons would effect your world? What time period would this be set in? Where? A magical version of London? Some kind of steampunk world? What would the name of the steampunk place be? What kind of steampunk is it- what's the city like? Does it stretch to the sky, crisscrossed with air ships and the forms of proud, wise dragons flying high above? Or is low and squat, skulking in the hills and shrubbery, mostly underground in an attempt to hide from the wicked dragons hunting from high above?
3) Figure out your characters.
Would you like a wise old sir? A young man? An evil dragon among the good? A good dragon among the wicked? Get a rough idea of who will be populating your world. Sometimes, you may be lucky enough to have a wonderful new character just waltz into your world, but in general you'll just get a vague impression of them. In that case, you'll need number four...
4) Get to know your characters.
Once I have a general idea of my character, you got to get to know them better. Some people will sort them into personality types... but for me I tend to sort them into Hogwarts Houses. Even then, it often isn't enough. Generally, when getting to know your character, it helps to base them off a person. I've based a plethora of characters off our wonderful Lauchlan (btw, to all of you wonderful people who I don't base characters off of, that's just because you're not as easy for me to write. That doesn't mean I like Lauchlan more than you or something- it simply means she's easier to write than you.) and even one in my Nanowrimo novel of my sister. You don't have to know them intimately- you'll figure out a lot of things as you write them- but you should know at least a little bit about them.
If you still don't feel like you know your character, I'd suggest filling out a sheet. You may not hit on something, but sometimes all the little detailing will fit together into something magnificent and there you'll have a detailed, rich character. Theoretically. It hasn't happened to me, but I'll keep on trying. Either way, it'll make your book more consistent if your character's hair color doesn't change every few pages.
5) Figure out a plot.
Ah, the plot. The hardest and most important part. Now that you kind of have your world, think of tensions. Some times tensions naturally arise- elves vs. dwarves, for instance, is a bit of a no-brainer. Woodland creatures, and creatures who like to live in the mountains might not mesh so well. Think of these tensions, and you've got some side plotting for fill ins... which still leaves a main plot.
Figure out the main character's goal. Figure out which people will stand in the way of that goal, and how they're likely to react. Think of how the character will react. Now take that template and try to line it up to a timeline of the character's week/day/year/life. Bam! Plot!
6) Do some tweaking.
Sometimes you may discover you've gotten a character wrong, or your world has holes, or your plot does. Fix them up, tweak them a bit. Add or remove characters. Polish out your plan.
Note- these don't have to go in order. You can scramble them up in any way, add or remove steps, or whatever. This is just how I usually do my Nanowrimo prep.
My first year (2014) I did 30k.
My second year (2015) I did 50k.
This year I am clearly insane, because I'm going to attempt 70k.
Why 70k if I know I'm going to get ridiculously stressed out and crash and burn and die a sad, pitiable death? Because in the last years I've advanced my word count by 20k each time, and 70k has a nice ring to it. You can put on my tombstone "She thought she could write 70k in a month".
Yeah. Anyway. I'm not planning on actually dying, but I do think it's going to be pretty stressful. I decided to try out writing like I will have to this November and I lasted around three days. Yeah. That was partly because I realized how awful my prep is, and panicked and completely abandoned my story for prep. (My prep still is awful.)
HOW TO DO YOUR NANOWRIMO PREP
(because I am cuh-LEARLY an expert. not)
1) Think of an idea.
Thinking of an idea seems like the easiest part, but it actually can be annoyingly difficult. To start off, think of the sort of story you'd like to read. A fantasy or steampunk world? Read a bunch of fantasy and steampunk books. Say you read a story with a bumch of dragons in it and you really like it- your story can have dragons! Bam! You have an idea! Not very fleshed out, but that's why we have step number two...2) Get some basic ideas.
How do you think having dragons would effect your world? What time period would this be set in? Where? A magical version of London? Some kind of steampunk world? What would the name of the steampunk place be? What kind of steampunk is it- what's the city like? Does it stretch to the sky, crisscrossed with air ships and the forms of proud, wise dragons flying high above? Or is low and squat, skulking in the hills and shrubbery, mostly underground in an attempt to hide from the wicked dragons hunting from high above?
3) Figure out your characters.
Would you like a wise old sir? A young man? An evil dragon among the good? A good dragon among the wicked? Get a rough idea of who will be populating your world. Sometimes, you may be lucky enough to have a wonderful new character just waltz into your world, but in general you'll just get a vague impression of them. In that case, you'll need number four...
4) Get to know your characters.
Once I have a general idea of my character, you got to get to know them better. Some people will sort them into personality types... but for me I tend to sort them into Hogwarts Houses. Even then, it often isn't enough. Generally, when getting to know your character, it helps to base them off a person. I've based a plethora of characters off our wonderful Lauchlan (btw, to all of you wonderful people who I don't base characters off of, that's just because you're not as easy for me to write. That doesn't mean I like Lauchlan more than you or something- it simply means she's easier to write than you.) and even one in my Nanowrimo novel of my sister. You don't have to know them intimately- you'll figure out a lot of things as you write them- but you should know at least a little bit about them.If you still don't feel like you know your character, I'd suggest filling out a sheet. You may not hit on something, but sometimes all the little detailing will fit together into something magnificent and there you'll have a detailed, rich character. Theoretically. It hasn't happened to me, but I'll keep on trying. Either way, it'll make your book more consistent if your character's hair color doesn't change every few pages.
5) Figure out a plot.
Ah, the plot. The hardest and most important part. Now that you kind of have your world, think of tensions. Some times tensions naturally arise- elves vs. dwarves, for instance, is a bit of a no-brainer. Woodland creatures, and creatures who like to live in the mountains might not mesh so well. Think of these tensions, and you've got some side plotting for fill ins... which still leaves a main plot.
Figure out the main character's goal. Figure out which people will stand in the way of that goal, and how they're likely to react. Think of how the character will react. Now take that template and try to line it up to a timeline of the character's week/day/year/life. Bam! Plot!
6) Do some tweaking.
Sometimes you may discover you've gotten a character wrong, or your world has holes, or your plot does. Fix them up, tweak them a bit. Add or remove characters. Polish out your plan.
Note- these don't have to go in order. You can scramble them up in any way, add or remove steps, or whatever. This is just how I usually do my Nanowrimo prep.
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