I was honestly looking forward to NaNoWriMo this year… and at the same time, not.
The reason I wasn’t looking forward to it was because I knew I had a number of projects already on the go. Did I really need to add one more work-in-progress? But, I thought seriously about it and realized that I STILL owed my Scout troop the entire, finished version of “Boy Scouts of the Apocalypse”.
That was why I WAS looking forward to NaNo. I would finally write the entire story, get the zombies out of my fevered brain and be able to face the troop when we went to camp.
And then, World Fantasy Convention happened and NaNo got chucked out the window. Despite my best intentions to NOT pitch any of my books, I still managed to do so for several projects. Yes, you heard right, I wasn’t planning on pitching anything.
That may sound strange, but I am not a fan of trying to sell things that either don’t exist (except in my aforementioned fevered brain), or aren’t quite ready for prime time. Doing so just sets unrealistic expectations that could lead to disappointment.
But, it ended up happening just the same. Fortunately, I was always able to preface my comments/pseudo-pitch with, “this work needs some revision before I send it out”, or “my writing partner and I are almost finished the first draft of this book”.
And, surprisingly, I still had people tell me to send my work in when it was ready. That put the pressure on me to get the work done and backburner NaNo.
I am quite disappointed because this is the first year since I started NaNo in 2005 that I haven’t won. And yet, I still feel like a winner because that 2005 novel is “Mik Murdoch, Boy Superhero” which is coming out next year. And it won’t be the last book that comes out. And I have interest in others. And…
Well, let me just say that I’m at peace with my decision to only partially participate.
For those of you who did compete with yourself in November, congratulations. Even if you didn’t hit the 50,000 words, you should feel good. The words you did get down are ones you didn’t have before. Keep plugging and you will have a book, or several short stories or whatever it was you set out to do.
