A few days ago I posted My Own Worst Enemy about how I couldn’t get those words on paper without an outline. Well, the day I posted it, I actually managed to finish a pretty large portion of that outline. And yesterday, thanks to the wonderful ladies of my Camp Cabin and our word sprints, I managed to have my most productive day so far: 5,786 words. In three hours (six half-hour sprints).
I was just reading back over those words as part of my pre-writing ritual. I don’t change anything – but I do read to see where I left off and what had happened. If I’m allowed to say so myself, they were (for the most part) good words. It’s a zero draft, and things will be cut, restructured, and re-written, of course. But I’m insanely happy about how yesterday’s writing turned out.
The first few days of flailing and panic aside – this round of NaNo has been my favorite so far. Those of us in my cabin found each other early –and instead of forming a cabin, we formed a writing group. We brainstormed together for almost a month, shared excerpts, and helped each other with plot points and characterization. It’s been wonderful. I know when I get stuck, I can pop on our forum and be like, “Hey, what do you think of this, how would you get out of this situation?” And the girls will fire back with beautiful ideas because they’re simply that amazing. We’re all writers, we write in different periods, some of us in different genres – but we’re all working toward the same goal: a finished novel. And that’s beautiful. I’ve never been part of a writing group – but this group is more than I could have ever hoped for. They’re invaluable, and I adore each one of them.
Yes, I’m getting all mushy – but I needed to vent my appreciation or I was going to explode.
Do you have a writing group – or do you prefer to write alone?
ashleycliston 