Whether you’re hitting the ground running on November 1 or you’ve given yourself the luxury of a planning period there’s a winning NaNo strategy for you.
Plan
You’ve given yourself time to plan it out. Now all you need is an idea. Oh and some characters. And a plot. No pressure then. Don’t forget, if you’re not a planner or are coming to this late it really doesn’t matter — there’s a whole other way of attacking NaNoWriMo — just skip to the next section.
The Idea and Your Characters
Maybe you already have an idea. They do tend pop up at odd moments (for me, it’s usually when I’m running). Either way, at this stage, a series of timed free writes is a good idea. You can do this with a timer app and a pad and paper or use the Write This Now simple timer.
If you need a little more inspiration, open a newspaper at random (or pick a news landing page online). Grab three headlines and write around the themes and images they suggest. You can use Write This Now’s scenario prompts in a similar way. Head to an image site like Flickr and grab an image at random. Write This Now also has an image prompt exercise with a timer. Also try Story Dice, a neat exercise which throws new prompt words at you every two minutes.
Your idea should suggest some characters. Give them some depth by delving into their pasts and personalities. Write This Now has a character questionnaire for this purpose.
What’s Happening?
Having completed the idea stage, you should hopefully have some ideas about your characters, your premise, and some vague plot points. It’s time to get a bit more specific. Pick the character you’re auditioning for protagonist and think about his or her problem — what does he or she need to fix, both about the world and about herself, in order to progress?
Play with your character to get a sense of his journey. A nice exercise is Yes But / No And. Define your character’s problem and decide the action he takes to fix it. Then ask, did it work? Answer either “Yes, but…” (the fix creates a new unexpected complication) or “No, and…” (the attempted fix not only did not solve the problem but made it worse). You can do this directly with a word processor or have Write This Now interrogate you. You may also need a looser exercise to get a sense of where your character might be going. Try Quickfire Plot, which prompts you to put your character through an assault course of actions and discoveries.
Plan
By this stage you should have plenty of characters and ideas. It’s time to pull them all together into a structure. Obviously this is a big topic, but it boils down to thinking about a beginning, in which your character is propelled from everyday life into your story; a middle, in which your character must negotiate the new world and come to grips with the challenge she faces; and the end in which your character faces the ultimate test. There are plenty of detailed templates out there, but perhaps the most flexible and effective — and the one I see recommended most at conferences right now — is the five-act structure described by John Yorke in Into The Woods. Naturally, Write This Now has an exercise for this. While you’re working on your plan, make sure that the plot points you’re hitting are plausible within the terms of your story. It’s no good having crafted a beautifully shaped story if your characters are behaving like crazy people just to fulfil it. Check on your characters’ decisionmaking with free writes or tools like Yes But / No And. Also, don’t fall into the trap of making your antagonists cartoonishly villainous — everyone thinks they’re the hero of their own story and that has to come across. Run all major characters through at least some of these steps.
Write
Whether you’re coming in cold or you’ve been through the planning mill, on day one you’ll have the same challenges: making word count and trying not to suck. Don’t sweat the second part of that. Now it’s playtime — and this is your sandbox. I have found that the best way to make word count is to break your sessions down into smaller timed writes. You’ll soon learn now many useful words you can write in a ten minute session. Once you know this, you can begin to plan your day around manageable writes. I generally allot a twenty minute or half-hour pre-breakfast writing period. If you can hit the main part of the day with five or six hundred words under your belt, then you pretty much know you’re going to be OK. Another session at lunchtime takes even more pressure off and, by the time you’re looking at a longer early evening write, you could be well over half way to your quota
If you can sit down and write for a solid hour, great! Personally, though, I tend to use Simple Timer for a couple of ten or fifteen minute focussed writes and then reward myself with five minutes or so browsing and snacking and coffee making.
If you haven’t prepared — don’t worry. By choice or design, you’re now an organic writer. Which is to say that your first draft is the plan. Read the section on Planning above and incorporate some those exercises into your work in progress. It’s all word count, after all. Some people feel that it’s cheating to leave the roughest of free writes in their NaNoWriMo novel. If that’s you, then you may have to be little more focussed. Nevertheless, try sparking ideas with Image Prompt, Quickfire Plot and Story Dice. It’s a good idea to do this periodically whether you’ve planned or not — exercises like this can generate new ideas, keep you fresh and get you unstuck.
At some time during the month — maybe all the time — you’re probably going to find yourself writing off-piste. Don’t worry. Nothing is wasted — you’re learning what works for your story and what doesn’t. If necessary, back up and try a new direction. Keep your words, even if you mark them for culling in revision!
Revise
The first thing to do is nothing. Really. Give it a week at least, preferably two. Let your work settle and come back to it with fresh eyes. At that point, read through once fast, making notes as you go. Build an outline of what you’ve written (probably now different from any initial plan you may have developed). Does it work? Is the tension right? Think about story structure again — plug your summary into the Five Act Structure or similar and begin to think about what needs cutting or rewriting. Do this a few times until you have it right. Post-It notes are great at this stage. Investigate any new characters with a questionnaire, look at motivations with a tool like Yes But / No And. In fact, go back to the planning tools as necessary. When you have your structural or macro-edit complete, it’s time to head back into the weeds. As you edit and rewrite, think about the work that each scene is doing in the wider novel. A tool like Setting a Scene can work here. Allow yourself to free write around your edits to keep your thinking loose and creative.