It all started with one suggestion. It all started when one person picked up the ball and ran with it. It all started when 50 odd people took up the challenge. What was the challenge? The challenge was to write 50ks in 30 days. It all started 1st June 2008.
Myself, Shona and Lesley all put our hands up to attempt the massive feat of writing 50,000 words in 30 days. Lesley had achieved that in the 'official' NANO month of November. It was my first attempt and it was Shona's first attempt.
I was a bit worried how I'd go, I mean I hadn't really sat down and written for the longest time. Would I be able to achieve that goal? I decided then to break it down into chunks. My goal was to write five 10,000 word novellas. I had started to hand write a novella last year, so I thought that would be a good place to start. By the second of June I had finished that story. In two days I had written over 10,000 words. I couldn't believe it!!
After that the words started to flow and I felt fabulous. Things went a little askew when my second story looked no where near the end at 10,000. So I just kept writing. That story finished at 23,699 - you'd think I could have found one more word to round it up to a nice even 23,700 and for someone who is obsessive about even numbers I surprised myself that I didn't.
So then I started on the third story. By now it was getting to crunch time. Also I should mention that my hubby was away for most of June so I only had myself and the kids to worry about. It left me with free time to sit and pound the keyboard. DH arrived back on 24th June by then my word total was, I think, about 46k. I was so close.
30th June was looming up fast. Would I make it? Would Shona make it? Would Lesley make it? I honestly didn't think I could do it but - I did!! I finished off the month with 50,560 words. That was the most I had ever written I was so proud of myself. Shona capped off the month with a total of 50,200 and for Lesley she did a brilliant effort of getting 10,000 words down - sometimes life messes up our plans. Although Lesley does have the title of being the only Wink Girl to have an 'official' Nano Certificate.
So what am I doing with the stories now? Well the third one isn't finished I'm at about 18k I think. I'm looking at editting the first one and submitting to an epublisher. Well that was my plan until the weekend. I decided on the weekend, after reading a fabulous Medical by Carol Marinelli, that I was going to try my hand at writing a medical and pitching that at conference. I had 44 days to get 50,000 words down. I'm 4k into the story at the moment but then life threw a curve ball at me.
What a curve ball it was!!! It was Brilliant! During my writing fest in June, in the back of my mind was the Desire Online Pitch Contest on e-harlequin - due date 30th June. I entered and I won an opportunity to pitch my story with a Desire Editor. I'm so excited so now I'm back onto the manuscript I wrote ages ago and using everything I've learned in the past few years to make it sparkle.
Life just gets better and better.
Don't forget to check out Loretta and Shona's websites for news updates and although I don't have a website - yet, I do have a blog.
Nicki
PS Notice the Anaphoram (not sure of spelling) in the first paragraph? Thanks Margie Lawson
