NaNoWriMo

Back in winter or spring or sometime like that, I got really excited about NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month, an event that happens in November, although it’s rather more international now). But then as the months went by I started to doubt the wisdom of hacking out a story for quantity rather than quality, considering I have something of an allergy to heavy editing and I have university. But I’ve been thinking about it lately and now I’m back into the idea again. Problem is, I still don’t really know what I’m going to write about. I need a story that’s epic enough to carry through 50,000 words. On top of that, it needs to be interesting enough for me not to give up on it, yet not so interesting that I feel really bad for getting it out in the form of shitty writing, because I know things will devolve into terribleness if I’m forcing words out for the sake of quantity. Yes, even a rambly writer like me. (It’s become a character trait for my main roleplay character to just sit around and inner-monologue for paragraphs, to the point where we call it Levi!ranting.)

Among the various original fiction ideas I have floating around, a couple strike my fancy to NaNo about, but each has its problems.

The first one is about a demon and an angel who probably have to save the world and romance is involved somewhere along the way. The demon is specifically an incubus, pureblood, with an extensive family tree, honour to uphold, and a decent position in the demon hierarchy. He’s got a bit of a reputation as well, though I’m still ironing that one out and it could be a bit of a plot point so I’ll leave it for now. The angel is actually half-angel and half-human, and his family history’s been more or less wiped since he got turned into a vampire some centuries prior to the story and fell out of touch with pretty much his entire life. He makes a pretty good life for himself, but occasionally his sire comes back to haunt him. This story actually originated from an intended one-shot PWP with a vampire and an incubus meeting and mutually feeding, but I’ve really pulled it away from its urban-fantasy-slice-of-life origins to make it something more substantial. I think this one would be really good for a NaNo, but I’m a bit too attached to it to sabotage it like that.

The second one is about a couple of high school guys in a homophobic society. So that’s a lot more standard. One was outed as a kid (I’m hazy on the details) and is now shunned and bullied, but he’s strong-willed and sticks up for himself and can hold up pretty well in a fight. The other figured himself out a bit later, at which point he was old enough to understand how much trouble telling would get him into, so he’s kept quiet. He’s become quite a popular guy, and knows exactly how to act to avoid suspicion. He kind of hates himself for it, and he really admires the first guy for not being afraid to be who he is. First guy finds out about second guy, and the story revolves around their relationships and experiences and probably eventually beating the homophobes because homophobia sucks. I’d be more willing to use this for NaNo because I’m not as attached to the idea as I am to the first one, but then I don’t know how well a slice-of-life story would hold up for something as lengthy as NaNo. It’s weird saying that after Two Face, but the fact is that slice-of-lifes haven’t really held up for me since TF. That said, nothing’s really held up for me, before or after TF, and maybe that’s just something I need to work on.

Thing is, I get the feeling that I probably won’t reach the 50,000-word mark. Obviously not everyone who embarks on NaNo succeeds, and I don’t think I’m made of the right stuff for it. But I think it’d be a good challenge for my writing and I’d learn lots of things and have fun doing it. At least I hope I will. And I was thinking I could post each day’s progress on this blog, as a slightly stronger incentive to myself to get it done. If I feel like I’m writing for someone, I’ll probably hold out for longer. And if I know at least one person is following along, if people offer feedback and criticism, then even better! I know this is only my second blog post and all that, but comments would be super duper appreciated. Are any of you doing NaNo this year? Have you done it before? If so, I want to hear about your experiences! Tell me what went right, what went wrong. Tell me things so that my NaNo might not fail as hard as I’m sure it will! And tell me, which idea do you think would work better, the fantasy one or the high school one?

The next time I post might be my first NaNo day or just before. I might chicken out at the last minute, or forget entirely. I may just hold out until the summer, when I don’t have a million things to do, and make it a JuNo (the unofficial NaNo that most students prefer). I think I’ll try to block out my ideas for the next couple of weeks and see how feasible NaNo seems once that’s been done.

Comment on this post, send me a message, PM me on FF.net. Let’s have a chat!

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