The First Sentence — National Novel Writing Month
Writing During NaNoWriMo November 2023
I think I might have just written the first line of my novel. I was skipping around Reddit this morning, and there was a question somebody asked in the r/Insightfulquestions subreddit. They said, “What words of wisdom would you pass on to your childhood self?”
I immediately said, “It won’t always be like this.”
I was both disturbed and stunned that I should come up with this the instant I read the question.
It almost felt like I was looking through a porthole from a spaceship as it was landing in a verdant land.
So, the beginning of a new book and the inspiration that led me here. I’ve created a new directory in my Documents Folder for whatever happens next month when NaNoWriMo starts. November 2023, and the writers are beginning to get their plans sorted in October.
It feels like I made a commitment. It wasn’t but a few days ago that I decided to participate this year. It was this morning that I came up with a first line.
Obviously, this is me (lead character) telling some poor little kid some valuable information. Or, not a kid, but somebody who is new to the situation.
Maybe I’ll just take today to fuss around with it. Marilyn just came to mind. Who else? Peter. Anybody else? Not for now.
Something I’ve been toying with is to get to know some of the characters prior to writing the book. That will start on November 1, but I could dibble around in some scenes just to get to know them.
If you’ve never written during the NaNoWriMo challenges, hope on board. As a writer, it will be fun. You will push yourself. You will have the company of thousands of other people who are also writing. It is free. The goal this November is 50,000 words written.
Whatever you write will be the first draft. It’s up to you to finish it up later on with however many edits you want, but the joy, the abandon, the sheer writing magic happens in November.
I’ve done NaNoWriMo several times. Nothing ever published, but close. I suppose I could elect to finish up one of the books I’d written before, but hey, I’m 68 years old. I make the rules.
By the way, the folks at NaNoWriMo have guidelines. These are not set-in-stone rules. It is on the honor system. You do not have to upload any bit of your manuscript, though if you want to share, you can. You can create a book cover if you want to.
You can participate in the forums or the write-alongs. Many locations will have physical write-ins if you want to meet folks in the flesh or lots of Zoom-like gatherings. I did one of them last time. It was the strangest video meeting I’d been to. Nobody talked. They just set a timer for 10 minutes, and we wrote. Heads down. Write. We’d break for a minute or so and then do it again. There was a bit of talking during the meeting, but mostly we wrote. At first, I thought it was going to be weird, but I actually enjoyed it.
What happens is there is a collective energy with so many people doing the same thing all at once. It is impressive.
I’ve just been poking around the site, and there are going to be four San Francisco online gatherings in October. All on Sundays, 10/8, 10/5, 10/22 and 10/29. All start at 1:00 pm Pacific Daylight Time and go for 1 ½ hours. They are called office hours, and you can ask whatever you want. I’m going to sign up for all of them.
If you’re in San Francisco, join in. Otherwise, there are about 300,000 writers from around the world participating, and you will be able to find a local chapter to be a part of. Or just do it by yourself if you want. There is also a Discord group for the San Francisco chapter.
My name at NaNoWriMo is pmevanosky. We can hook up and be friends if you like.
The Links: The Question at Reddit NaNoWriMo — National Novel Writing Month NaNoWriMo — Find a region there were 671 regions on six continents last year.