Under a Gibbous Moon

In about ten minutes it will be the 15th of November and National Novel Writing Month will be half over. I have also reached a bit over the half way mark. As the 14 comes to a close I have written 25,466 words.

It has been interesting journey so far. According to the spreadsheet that they give you to keep track of your progress I have spent about 28 hours working on my novel. It has been harding going at points. There was a three day stretch that I did not manage to write a single word and there was one day that I wrote almost 5,000.

Even though I had the entire thing outlined from the beginning, it has managed to take twists and turns that not even I anticipated. I can say that reaching the halfway mark I am very confident that I will manage to reach at least 50,000 words by the end of the month. I don’t think that it will get much easier but I do have a rhythm now that keeps me going.

The last 15 days have definitely been a worthwhile experience. I imagine that the next 15 days will prove interesting too.

I got exactly nothing accomplished on my novel yesterday. As bad as it sounds, I just didn’t feel like it. I think it is bad when something that is supposed to be fun starts to feel like an obligation. Therefore, I decided to take today off. I did not write anything for my novel, I didn’t even think about it.

I’m far enough ahead that I am in no danger of falling behind. Tomorrow I’m going to work on expanding a couple of scenes to get my words-per-scene up to where I think that they need to be.

I will finish this.

Participants in the National Novel Writing Month claim that they do it for the love of literature and writing. They say that they do it for the challenge of trying to craft a novel in only 30 short days.

The Real truth is, though something much darker:

Mmmmm... Chocolate

We do it for the free chocolate bar :)

Two days in, and I’ve put almost 8,000 words to page. Here is the prologue:

A dark shadow fell across Spring Hill Road. A dark inky blackness that not even the moon above could penetrate. It wound its way sinuously, creeping from side to side extinguishing the streetlights as it passed and casting the street further into darkness. A deathly chill crept followed in the shadows wake, a mist forming in the deserted street.

A figure stepped out of the darkness, moving swiftly along the sidewalk, the figure kept to the shadow as if it where his own. Halfway down the street he stopped in front of a house. (continue reading…)

With the stoke of midnight in each time zone around the world, thousands of writers pick up the pen and answer the challenge that is Nation Novel Writing Month.

As with all challenges many will try but few will succeed in having put at least 50,000 words to paper by the end of the month.

I wish everyone who is taking part the best of luck and every encouragement. Stick with it and you will persevere and even if you don’t NaNoWriMo is far more about the journey than it is the end anyway.