Finally, I want to say congratulations. If nothing else, you made it though my read-along of No Plot? No Problem! And given some of my rants, I think that's an accomplishment in itself. I recommend you go read the book yourself next year if you didn't this year.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go spend some time not typing anything.Yes, I'm aware this is a bit premature; we still have today and tomorrow to finish, so go ahead, shrink your browser, and come back December 1 if you're not done. (Back up your work first!)
But then there's the holiday. Especially this year, with Thanksgiving falling so late, I was hoping to finish by Wednesday. Yeah, go ahead and laugh. Baty recommends giving family the heads-up, but I don't see that helping a lot in my case. Ultimately, he wishes us luck. Thanks, Baty. We need it.Yikes, Thanksgiving is late this year, too. If your plans are chill, it's the perfect time cram in words for the home stretch. If not... well, you can join past-me (and probably present-me) in trying to finish by Wednesday.
Wow, I'm not sure if I'll be able to do that, but you should try and let me know how it goes! Most people will either be in pretty bad word debt at this point (me!) or they'll be just getting ready to finish early (hopefully you!). Good luck, and don't forget to back up your work.
If Our Hero is kind of a douche and you find yourself writing more about his bumbling sidekick, that's probably a good sign that it's time to switch protagonists. Sit down for a second, see if there's story potential there, and if so, go! But do not delete what you already wrote! It still counts!You've info-dumped all your world-building exposition, and now it's time for your characters to do something in your setting! How exciting! What a pain in the ass!
Oh, this is the rough part. The one year I came closest to winning, ugh. Just thinking about that manuscript makes me shudder. But you know what? It got a story idea out of my head and onto the computer screen, and maybe, someday, if that idea starts bugging me again, I'll have something I can take apart and put back together.Happy November! It's time to take all the prep we've been doing and get to vomiting those words onto that page!
Seven days, according to Baty, lets you get a nice goundwork ready, but prevents us from overplanning. You don't want to paralyze yourself with a brilliant concept that your writing can't possibly live up to, you don't want planning to turn into a form of procrastination, and you don't want to suck the elements of fun and surprise out of the actual writing process. Instead, ask yourself what makes a good novel. I'll start.Basically, you want to write a book that you'll also want to read. So what do you like to read?
