I just finished doing NaNoWriMo for 2013. This is a month-long writing competition where the goal is to write a 50,000 word novel by the end of the month. This is my second year running and my second “win”
Winner winner!
This is pretty much all the recognition I will get for my writing efforts. It’s really an exercise in forced writing meant to inspire the every day writing process and exercise the writing muscle and I do believe that it works to an extent.
This year I tried my hand at literary fiction. A type of novel that deals more with character studies, it is more serious, more descriptive and more in-depth than other genres. It is also much tougher to write. Whereas other genres like sci-fi or horror or fantasy have certain characteristics that they can lean on, literary fiction really doesn’t. I thought I had made a huge mistake starting this novel. Somehow I finished it though it’s not my best work and it is a far darker work than I usually like to write.
As far as the writing process, I spent several hours tied to my desktop at home but I took the extra step of going to cafes to write for this competition. I got a surprising amount done at these cafes and really enjoyed the experience. Although I must say that I began to feel like a permanent resident of the Inner loop with the amount of time I was spending in the cafes in and around the Montrose and Heights areas.
But it paid off. All the evenings on the desktop and all the weekends drinking coffee and tea inside dimly lit establishments led to my second novel.
One thing I have noticed though is that I don’t want to write any new novels or even short stories for the short-term.
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