Nanowrimo 2020: The First Week

 

If you're taking part in this year's Nanowrimo, I hope you've got off to a good start. 

For Nano this year, I'm writing the first chunk of Book 13, which is a Christmassy rom com with a sprinkling of magic. I've surprised myself with the amount I've got down so far, but I also know that I won't necessarily maintain this amount for the full month as I could hit a brick wall (aka The Slump) or life could get in the way. But I'm going to celebrate my word count milestones as and when they arrive!

On Sunday, my local Nano group 'met' up on Zoom. Last year, we met at the library but this isn't possible at the moment due to coronavirus, and we weren't sure how a write-in would work out online, but it went really well. We had a chat and we wrote with the screen split between our Word document (or equivalent) and our Zoom meeting, and I managed to write a further 2,000 (ish) words, bringing my daily total to 3,811. Which I think it is a pretty good starting point.

We also have a Facebook page, where we can update our word counts, cheer each other on and discuss any problems we may be having. It definitely helps having a support network! Last night we had another meeting where we discussed opposites in fiction, and I found it really interesting and it's something I'm going to give more thought to going forward.

As I'm writing a Christmas novel, I've been getting myself in the festive mood by listening to Heart Christmas (any excuse) and I've got the festive mugs out a month earlier than usual.

My aim is to write 2,000 words, six days a week, which gives me either a day off a week or the chance to catch up if I fall behind my schedule. And so far I've managed to reach that target - and a bit more each day this week. And on Tuesday I reached my first milestone - 10,000 words.

There are still a couple of days left of Nano's first week, so I'm going to get as many words down as I can, while the motivation is still high.

How are you getting on? Let us know in the comments below :)