Like I said, I've been doing this for seven years. I started in 2007 when I discovered it while looking for writing contests on the internet. I didn't do so great that first year. I was still a teenager, and back then I had almost no stick-to-it power. I think I wrote maybe 600 words on a story about a young girl who discovered she was a witch -- after dressing up like one for Halloween -- and she traveled to the Witch World, which was very much Halloween inspired. Needless to say it was a failure, but I hadn't really invested much into the NaNo-ing community and I quickly put in out of my mind.
2008 was the first year I won. I wrote just a little over the required 50k about a girl who discovers that she is the reincarnation of the Greek goddess Artemis. I even named the novel Huntress. It was a fun story to write, and a lot of my friends liked it a lot. And this was around the same time that Greek mythology was all the rage with the Percy Jackson series, so theoretically I could have done something with it. But, again, I was still young and in an attempt to actually reach the 50k, I had padded the story like crazy. There were descriptions of books the main character was reading, the most elaborate birthday party I could think of, I refused to use contractions, and because I finished the actual story before 50k, I started the -- horrible-- sequel to fill in the end. When I went through and took all the fluff out and fixed the lack of contractions, I reduced the word out to a poor 20k. I still consider it my first completed novel, but it has gone through so many revisions since the beginning that it is barely recognizable as the same story.
2009 and 2010 were not the best years. Life got in the way a lot, and even though I had finished a novel before, I somehow was unable to recreate the magical circumstances that allowed me win previously. In 2009 I tried my hand at a mystery with a generous dash of fantasy. It was about a detective whose -- unknown -- younger sister could see the past because walls kept echos of everything, and she could see those echos. I got maybe 25k into the story before I gave up. It wasn't entertaining, and the characters were all too much like cardboard cutouts. So instead, I tried switching to something else and jumped around maybe ten different stories for the remaining 25k. I sort of considered it a win, because I reached 50k, but I didn't finish a novel, so it wasn't the same.
Then I did about the same thing in 2010. Only this time I was trying to work with high fantasy. The story was interesting, about a young lady who -- through her various adventures -- becomes the Shieldmaiden Empress of the land. If I had a better understanding of writing and plotting and important things like that, I suppose I would have been able to finish this story. But, I didn't get more than 10k, and probably not even that. And like in 2009, I finished the rest of the month jumping from story to story, unable to stick with any one idea. It was another disaster, and I ended the year feeling like a fraud.
2011 was when life decided to really kick things into gear and I joined the United States Air Force. This has been one of the best decisions of my life, but it meant that for a few years I wouldn't be able to write with any kind of consistency. 2011 I was learning Korean for my new job, which didn't leave much time for writing. I tried, because the siren call of NaNoWriMo is hard to ignore. But the story I decided to go with was not the best thing I could have gone with. It was about a group of people who accidentally get sucked through a wormhole into a fantasy world, and all the dangers they face there. Half of my characters were based on real people, which made them incredibly hard to write, and while I probably would have finished it, my homework load at the time was such that I had zero time left over to write. Because homework had to come first. It was my job, after all.
Then in 2012, I was determined NOT to do NaNoWriMo. All of my learning and studying Korean was heading for a major test in the middle of November, and if I didn't pass this test, my life would take a horrifying nosedive. So, I wasn't going to do it. I wasn't going to do it right up until I was doing it on November 1st. I'm telling you, it's hard to say no to NaNoWriMo. So in between studying for this test and my homework, I tried to write a story about a group of farmers and fishermen in a little bay being the only thing that is stopping a massive invasion from a land across the sea. I broke personal records with this story. The first Saturday of the month I wrote an amazing 17k, the most I had ever written in one day. But after that day, I couldn't get myself to write anymore. I hated the main female character more than I had ever hated a character before, and I had no idea how the farmers and fishermen were going to repel this army that was supposed to come through. So I stopped and just focused on my studies.
This year, 2013, has been an amazing year. I passed all my tests and graduated from my two schools, then started working at my real job with the Air Force. I moved to a new country, and FINALLY had time to really write. So this year, I was determined to win, for real like in 2008. And I tried something new.
For the most part in the past, I've been more of a hobby writer, and a pantser -- which is a term used in the NaNo community to mean someone who writes by the seat of their pants. Just pen to paper or fingers to keyboard and writing whatever comes to mind. While thinking about my writing and during a particular writing crisis I had -- did I really want to write and publish for a living? What was I doing to accomplish this? -- I decided that pantsing was not working for me. And while I had always kept it in my mind that I wanted to publish, my real attitude towards writing has always been leaning more towards hobby instead of profession. So this year I wanted to work towards being a real writer. So for NaNo 2013 I sat down in October and spent the entire month plotting and outlining and getting things ready so when November came around, I just had to write the story. I wouldn't have to think about what happened next, I would just have to write.
And it worked. This year I chose a story about twin brothers who live in a modern era of a fantasy world. And these twins get sent back in time with the goal of stopping a Godwar from happening. And because I had plotted everything already, it was easier to write. Of course, I let myself do a little pantsing, because where's the fun in just following the outline, so some things I wrote ended up surprising me. But overall, it's been loads easier than any year I've done before. And I reached 50k on November 21st, which made me giddy and excited, even though the story wasn't even halfway done.
And then, because I had reached the month's word count goal, I stopped. I knew I still had to finish the novel, but I spent a few days recovering from my intensive writing days and just basking in the wonderful feeling of reaching 50k 9 days early. Then I dove back into the story and tried to finish. Of course, life still got in the way with a major Doctor Who event, and Thanksgiving and the like, but I pushed forward and kept moving towards that goal of finishing the novel.
Unfortunately, I haven't finished the novel. I went too many days with writing nothing, and was over 20k left in the story, it wasn't possible to finish in time.
But I learned something this year, something important that makes me want to keep writing no matter what. I learned that even though writing is hard -- which I knew already -- writing and reaching goals and finishing things is so rewarding and worth doing. I learned that -- despite my misgivings in the past and my 'do I really want to publish' crisis -- I do want to write and publish and that if I just work hard on it, as hard as I have worked at my job in the Air Force, then I can reach my goals, and I can fulfill my dreams and I can become the writer I want to be.
So this NaNoWriMo has been an amazing year of discovery and learning, and I can't wait for next November so I can keep learning more and more.
I remember that story of the "echos on the wall" and thought it was fascinating. You have the most active imagination! Keep writing! You are wonderful.
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