One Hero's Writing Journey (NaNoWriMo)

Hey, guys!

This time I wanted to talk about something very important to me - writing, and, more specifically, my own writing journey with my most recent writing project. Because of the subject matter, I thought it only fitting to present it in the 12-stage Hero's Journey structure (adapted from the work of Joseph Campbell by Christopher Vogler) from "Ordinary Life" all the way to "Return with the Elixir."

So, without further ado, here we go:

Ordinary Life & Call to Adventure

For many novelists and novelist wannabes alike November is the month of no other than (drum roll, please) NaNoWriMo! If you're wondering what the heck NaNoWriMo is, suffice it to say that it stands for National Novel Writing Month and the idea is quite simply to write a novel (50,000 words) in the month of November.

Simple, right? Yeah, not so much.

Now, as somebody who would count herself as part of the aforementioned "novelist wannabes" tribe, I've known of NaNoWriMo for years and even attempted to write several novels, but to little success. My most recent project began in 2016 when I got a great idea for a story, wrote around 40,000 words, scrapped 20,000 of them, then wrote another 20,000, tripped over some gaping plot holes, banged my head against the wall (well, the desk, actually) both figuratively and literally, and then - tired of the fight - put the manuscript away for many moons. It wasn't until not too long ago when I experienced one of those "moments of clarity while showering" (not sure if that's a thing but it sure should be) and suddenly knew exactly what to do to fix the book: I needed to add a second POV (point of view) to the story! Which was a great idea in theory, but in practice meant that I had to write about another 40,000 words from scratch. And if I were so crazy as to put myself through that process again, I knew I needed a good kick in the pants to start writing.

And then along came NaNoWriMo.

Refusal of the Call

Now, while writing a novel in a month might sound like a completely crazy idea, believe you me there are lots of people who have actually managed it - some with a full-time job, family, and all that jazz! Granted, the work doesn't probably always turn out a masterpiece in just 30 days, but it can very well have all the potential to be one after some polishing.

However, even though I knew that writing a novel in a month could be done, I wasn't at all convinced that I could do it. Here's why: In addition to being the slowest writer in the world (why do you think I only publish 1-2 blog posts a month?), I regularly commit all the cardinal writerly sins that people much wiser than me will tell you to avoid at all cost: a) I don't write chronologically, b) I don't outline, and, the worst of all, c) I edit as I write (I know, I know... the flames of Writerly Hell await). All of these factors together slow my writing way down, and, as NaNoWriMo is more or less about speed, the sane thing for me to do was clearly NOT to participate in NaNoWriMo.

However.

I've never claimed to be a particularly sane person. So, after the three mandatory (and oddly biblical) denials, I finally said yes to the stress (see what I did there?).

Meeting the Mentor

As a modern woman, I looked no further than online for NaNoWriMo-related writing advice. The official NaNoWriMo website (with which I'm in no way affiliated) has tons of resources, but you can also find good advice elsewhere online, not only for conquering NaNoWriMo but also for planning your novel the month before (this is called Prep_tober, a term coined by Rachael Stephen).

After having familiarized myself with the material I found online, I made one big change to my writing routine. I decided I couldn't just doggedly hold onto my old habits - If I wanted to add speed to my writing, I would have to adapt, so I did what I've never done before: I created an outline. In fact, I got so excited about this idea that not only did I create an outline, I created a storyboard!

Said storyboard. You cannot read that, right? Right?

The storyboard was made of different color Post-its. Each Post-it represented a different scene in the story and each color a different POV. As I put these scenes together, I was able to see the big picture and easily switch scenes around if I so decided.

Spoiler alert

With my storyboard assembled, a notebook handy, and a cursor blinking on the blank page, I was ready to begin.

Crossing the First Threshold

My actual NaNoWriMo journey started on the first official day of Gingerbread Latte, also known as the 1st of November. However, my Gingerbread Latte (I love it, don't judge) was had in the corner of my sofa at home, in the midst of a sea of Kleenex. I was quite heavily under the weather, and yes, I do blame my weakened state for the fact that I only managed a disappointing 299 words of pointless fluff that day.

However, as any decent hero's journey, this one too is not without its teachable moments. What I learned from my first attempt at NaNoWriMo 2018 was that I needed to approach my writing more methodically, so the following day I scrapped the words I had written the day before, actually planned the scene I was going to tackle (See? It turns out you can teach an old non-outliner new tricks) and rewrote it. This time I managed 1,387 words and was pretty happy with the end result.

Test, Allies and Enemies

At the beginning of my NaNoWriMo journey, I sought the help of many a different writer (online and in person) who offered their tricks and hacks to help other writers conquer NaNoWriMo.

One thing that seemed to receive praise across the board was something called Write or Die. As mentioned before, one of my biggest writerly sins is that I edit as I go. This is bad mostly because if you get stuck polishing one scene, you usually end up writing no new scenes. Here's where Write or Die comes in (NOTE! I only tried the free trial version and am not getting paid to say anything about it). The idea of this writing software is simply to write without lifting your fingers off the keyboard because the moment you stop writing (I think my settings were set for 12 seconds), the screen turns pink and then red and finally starts gobbling up the precious words you've spilled out of your soul. But that's not even the worst part. The worst part is that godawful noise the software starts emitting, the equivalent of nails on a chalkboard (except, like, on steroids), and pretty soon you realize that you'll happily keep writing just so you can die without ever having to hear that sound again.

Write or Die in its happy state

Write or Die getting irked (notice the pink)

Write or Die in its full-on rage mode

Another thing that everybody's been raving about for ages is Scrivener. Until November, I had always resisted this writing software, first because I didn't want to just give into any passing fad, then because I had already resisted for so long that caving now would've felt like admitting defeat, and finally because I was just being an idiot. For the purpose of NaNoWriMo, however, I finally downloaded the free trial (special NaNoWriMo) version.

I'm still getting used to Scrivener, but so far I've found that for organizational purposes it's pretty great - especially for all you plotters out there - as you can, for instance, switch chapters around and write notes for yourself. If you want more information, you can visit their website (again, nobody's paying me to say anything about Scrivener, I just happened to like it :).

Approach to the Inmost Cave

So. Around mid-November I'd been NaNo-ing pretty consistently for almost two weeks, writing around 700 words every day (sometimes less, sometimes more) and making good, steady progress until...

Ordeal

... life happened. This "happening of life" occurred on the morning of the 13th of November when my fiancé and I realized that our time in Europe was coming to an inevitable end and we would now have to move to my fiancé's native Mexico, which meant preparing physically and mentally for the move.

Reward

After having come to terms with moving country and getting our stuff more or less (mostly less) in order, I finally sat down and scheduled some time for my novel.

And then I was writing again, and that was reward enough.

Road back

Before I knew it, I was on the home stretch. It was the 20th of November, I was 14,347 words into my second POV part of the manuscript, and well over half-way through November. I was doing good.

And then, on the 21st of November, I made a classic rookie mistake:

I read what I had written. DUNN DUNN DUNNN

What ensued was a crippling case of self-doubt, tears, long complainy monologues which more often than not featured the phrase, "Why am I even writing this crap?" and - as I don't write on paper, which I could have crumpled up or torn to shreds - moody clicking of the x button in the corner of my Scrivener file. Even though I knew that the first draft was most likely going to be crap, I was still shocked by the level of its crappiness.

Eventually, all of this self-doubt and self-pity translated into the ultimate NaNoWriMo sin - NOT writing.

Resurrection

After a whole five days of not writing (that's like a decade in NaNoWriMo years), I did the proverbial uncrumpling of the manuscript (I opened the Scrivener file), picked up a pen (poised my fingers over the keyboard), and started again. I looked through the scenes I had written (not too much in detail, though, so as not to create another meltdown), fully ready to fall into agony until...

CLICK.

The transitions between the first three chapters that, until then, had never quite made sense to me, now seemed clear. Suddenly, I knew exactly what to do to make these chapters fit together like Tetris blocks.

That was a big win. 

Return with the Elixir

And then came the 30th of November, the last day of NaNoWriMo (and the publication day of this blog post), and it was time to take stock of my progress.

So, what did I accomplish? Well, in addition to learning some writing hacks along the way, I managed to write a total of 20,790 new words. And even though that falls short of my original goal, it's not an altogether bad result. If there are about 200 words per page in a book written in English, then 20,790 words would translate into almost 104 pages. That's a start. Or - as in my case - that's even closer to the finish line.

But since this step is entitled Return with the elixir, I'll give you a little extract of that elixir (the first chapter of my book). Hope you enjoy, and if you don't, just remember that it's not yet finished 😜!

Closing Words

If you participated in NaNoWriMo this year, let me know how you did in the comments! Wherever in your hero's journey you are (in writing or in life in general), I wish you courage and good luck 💗!