NaNoWriMo 2020 Week 1

It’s the Friday night before the NaNoWriMo 2020 challenge begins and honestly, I’m more nervous about this year than I was the first time I participated.

So much of the worry is steeped in the pandemic, in the general nerve and stress and worry that comes with doing any of our everyday things within the pandemic for myself, my spouse, and our young family. I know it is going to be harder this year because everything is harder this year, BUT it is important to me so I am going to do my best to complete it and complete it well. The excitement I feel when I think about this story, when I think about colliding these two groups of characters that have been wondering the same world for the first time and watching them figure out how they will move forward together just makes me giddy. These groups cannot move forward and get where they’re going without the other and it is going to create some beautiful friction. When I think about writing it, in that moment that I imagine writing the story, is when the nervousness quiets down. When I go to that place of imagining writing the last book in this trilogy, of building the conclusion to this portion of what happens within this world (because we know writing an ending doesn’t mean the story is finished) is the moment when my mind goes still. Everything within me quiets and waits for the characters to move, to follow them where they’re going and chronicle their journey.

Last week I took the week off from writing in general. I needed to create space in my mind and that really came in the form of clearing out my expectations and realigning my view of what November is going to be. I made sure to put down in my calendar and planners that I am writing a draft of a manuscript in November and that is the only goal I will be working on. Any moment that I can find within the days and weeks of November, any hour I can take to write, is dedicated to that manuscript.

Day 1: 1,790 words! My couples from the first two books have met and realize just how different their journey thus far has been. They don’t yet realize just how much further they have to go, nor that the path they thought they were on is going to change so freaking drastically. They have no clue. This is going to be good. 🙂

Happy Writing!