Head on over to National Novel Writing Month to participate in the annual drive for new writers. The event starts a few weeks before November, the official start is November 1st, and it lasts through November 30th. A contest with oneself to produce 50,000 words of novel in one month, NaNoWriMo draws participants from all over the world who are writing in all genres. There are no prizes other than a nice certificate and a deep sense of accomplishment.

Being a writer doesn't take anything other than sitting down to a blank sheet of paper or computer document and putting words to paper. Being a professional writer is a much more complicated process, but that's not what NaNoWriMo is about. It's about letting your creativity out in a safe place where there is no one to criticize or question why you're trying to write.

Why on Earth would anyone want to spend a month trying to drag that many words out of their subconscious? Well, for one it's a better way to spend time than watching infinite repeats of "Friends" episodes. In all seriousness, everyone has a story worth telling, and participating in this contest can be a great way to start telling it. Ray Bradbury burned the first million words he ever wrote because they were horrible. Robert Heinlein got published on the first story he submitted to an editor, but he had been telling stories in the Navy for twenty years first. Everybody starts out as bad writers, and the only way to ever be a good writer is, in fact, to write.

Being the cosmopolitan person that you are … you of course are familiar with the beer tossing refrigerator … aren't you?

The only requirement of the contest is that you write 50,000 words in one month. There is no one to check for cheating, because you're not competing with anyone but yourself and there are no valuable prizes. There is no one who reads your book without you volunteering for it. The words are counted by a computer bot, and deleted immediately after counting. You can repeat the same word fifty thousand times if you want, although it would seem to me that there's not much point.

The last time I participated, I got a mess that may someday be a novel. It has a beginning, two chunks of middle that need a connecting chapter or three, and there is no end in sight yet. I'm thinking it's probably an eighty thousand word novel that I just started on in November. The point is that the novel doesn't have to be done, nor does it have to be written in order, and there is a whole world of fellow writers on the forums to cheer everybody on. NaNoWriMo is a way for anyone to start writing, and gives permission to worry about being good at it later.

Posted by Loni.