Camp NaNoWriMo 2012: Week -1

Each of the last two Novembers, I have participated in National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), which is a program where the goal is to write a 50,000 word novel in the month of November. Each year, I have succeeded in my goal of 50k words.

Now, this April, I am going to do Camp NaNoWriMo, which is kind of like off season novel writing. Because 50k is a lot of work, and I do not have as much time right now as I did in November, I am taking advantage of the custom word count goals, and setting my goal at 30,000 words. Having done 50k twice now, I know that 30k will be very achievable, but still takes some dedication and hard work.

This last November, my novel did not go very well, and I ended up switching up ideas part way through, which meant that I did not end up with a complete novel. I think part of my problem was that I planned out my plot a little too much. Now, I know planning works well for some people, but for me, when ever I plan too carefully, I get stuck at some point and end up stalled out there.

Because of that, I am going to try going the totally opposite direction this April. I am not going to plan anything at all. I have no idea who my characters are going to be, or what my story will be about. Also, with only 30k words, I can focus a lot more on the story as I write it, since I won't need to worry so much about just getting words written.

Since I only need to write 1000 words a day, it should not be too time consuming, but it will also help keep me in the writing mood. :) They also do Camp NaNoWriMo in July, and I hope to do it then as well, probably with a smaller word count then too. That will help me stop getting too rusty by the time NaNoWriMo comes around again.

Every Tuesday from now until May, I will write a quick post about how the writing is going. I will have all the normal posts as well during that time, though many of them will probably have been written ahead of time and just be published then to give me more writing time.

Is anyone else going Camp NaNoWriMo this April?