How to Participate in NaNoWriMo

November is National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), so it's time to stop procrastinating and finally write your novel. But you are not alone, National Novel Writing Month is celebrating by thousands of writers just like you. You can sign up to participate and be a part of November's writing frenzy.

Difficulty: Moderately Challenging

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• A computer with a word processor or a lot of paper and a sturdy pen/pencil
• Access to the internet
• A will of steel
• A sense of adventure

1. Sign up on the NaNoWriMo website (http://www.nanowrimo.org). The average novel is 50,000 words and that is the goal you are shooting for by signing up on the official NaNoWriMo page. It sounds daunting, but it can be done. The NaNoWriMo site stresses that this is a way to catalyze your creative juices in a fun devil-may care manner. So you have no idea what you will write about? No problem is NaNoWriMo's stance. By signing up and being apart of the official activity you can compete with other writers, and when you are stuck, you can post in the forum and connect with other writers to help you along. It doesn't hurt to read some of the tips and suggestions by other writers posted on the forum before you get started. By signing up on the website you are immediately connected to a network of writers and the NaNoWriMo site will verify your word count. But they have a specific set of rules you should follow (no using previously written prose, no sharing writing duties with a partner, start your novel from scratch, etc.) Check those out before beginning.

2. 
    

   There are lots of resources that can help you through your month of novel writing. NaNoWriMo suggests No Plot? No Problem by Chris Baty. But there are others. Keep in mind that even the official NaNoWriMo people let you sketch out a plot outline before hand. So ruminate! You'll be surprised at how easy the ideas flow.

3. For some people signing up on the NaNoWriMo website isn't their piece of cake. Which make sense, writers are naturally rule breakers, which is part of the problem. To be a successful writer you have to have follow-through to see a project to the bitter end. So, even if you don't sign up for NaNoWriMo, set yourself some goals and stick to them. Decide on a goal--you will write 2 hours a day, 500 words a day, etc--and you keep yourself accountable.

Tips & Warnings

• Encourage some friends to join you and keep you accountable.
• Set aside time every day to write and keep that time sacred.
• Have fun! You are not writing the Great American Novel, no one is. And even if you wrote it you probably wouldn't know until you were dead anyway. So have fun, be daring, write in an alien if necessary. But get the job done.
• Excessive writing can lead to alienation from family and friends, a perverse desire to wear a beret or smoke European cigarettes while mumbling incomprehensible philosophical statements.