Cuisine of Loneliness

Reasons November is not a good month for NaNoWriMO

1. Thanksgiving,
2. Especially if you are hosting a dinner
3. Or have company for the weekend,
4. And even worse if you are traveling.
5. Volleyball is still going, including Selection Sunday
6. Basketball gears up
7. Really bad if you have men’s and women’s tickets
8. And if you’re one of those crazies who also has football tickets? Exactly when would you have time to write?
9. And there’s NFL games, NBA games, and hockey, too. At least I think that last is true.
10. Some Nanoers gather to write, and probably eat, but since the month is bracketed by Halloween candy and Thanksgiving, that in itself might not be a good idea.
11. There’re all those craft shows for holiday giving, and
12. That day after Thanksgiving where so many shop.
13. Start of Christmas cookie baking.
14. Other holiday planning and doing.
15. And it’s close to the end of the semester for many schools.

There are plenty of good reasons to take the challenge. For instance, this site lists 14 published books written during Nano. There are sites that give you ideas of how to make this month productive, as well as this blog by WFWA and RMFW member, Jamie Raintree, with ways to convert this month into a productive year.

Even with evidence that this month truly does work, I’m not participating. When I’ve attempted this exercise in the past, I’ve ended up with a mess. I did “win,” but I’m still trying to untangle the knots from four years ago.

My writing group has tried some alternate “months of writing.” We’ve picked a month with the idea of writing a story a week. Each week one of us emailed prompts. Although I haven’t checked with the others, I know at least two of the stories I produced have either been published or are slated to come out soon. This shorter, more focused exercise works better for me.

Are you Nanoing? How has the process worked for you in the past?