Last night wrapped up this years NaNoWriMo. The road to 50,000 words is often long and arduous. Sometimes unexpected things happen, sometimes unthinkable things happen. Regardless of whether you finished by hitting your goal or if you came up short know that you are all winners. You started something this week that many people only dream about. You began a journey that many are not brave enough to walk. You wrestled your ideas on to the blank page and made them real. You started your story. Now what?
Well first things first, pat yourself on the back and take a day or two off. Thirty days of heavy writing takes a toll and everyone, even you, needs to take a break every now and again to recharge. Regroup. To plan what comes next.If you are like me your novel is not finished with 50,000 words. In fact some of you are not even half way done. This is normal. I have not produced a completed manuscript for any of the past WriMo’s. A writer does not stop writing when the counter hits 50,000, she writes until her story is told.
NaNoWriMo is a springboard. A jumpstart to get your writing muscles moving. Don’t let that momentum go to waste. Keep on writing. If your story is done then edit it or begin a new one. Just keep on writing. I can usually use WriMo’s momentum to sustain me until spring. You would be surprised how much you can accomplish in that amount of time!
I learned a lot last month. The most important of which is that I am not very good at coming into WriMo without a plan. I have a bunch of different ideas and chapters that need to be placed in order, combined and organized. For the next several weeks I will be taking what I learned in November and will put together a plan for the rest of the year. December I will finish the primary writing and move to editing, polishing and editing again. Be prepared to read your story over and over again, because it takes more than one draft to get a polished book.
So ho did y’all do? For now, we celebrate! Then we write! Congratulations WriMo’s!