In 2022, 51,670 people each wrote tens of thousands of words for a novel in exactly a month. How? National Novel Writing Month, NaNoWriMo for short, which started in 1999 as a challenge for writers to write 50,000 words of a novel in a month. Now, it’s morphed into something much larger; every November thousands of people- students, teachers, business people- write a novel.
As high-schoolers, there are options for us too. The NaNoWriMo Young Writers program allows youth to set our own, more manageable writing goals. In both 2020 and 2021 I wrote 30,000 word novels. These novels weren’t perfect, in fact, they were far from it, but with them I proved to myself that I could write, and if I wanted to I could write a whole novel. In addition, I wrote alongside a friend, and watching our own worlds unfold in front of us was a magical experience.
In addition to posing a daring challenge, NaNoWriMo also provides plenty of support for the wildly creative but taxing time that is November for writers. The suggested word-count for each day is shown, each word building towards a goal. Before November, there are many PDFs of planning material that can help.
There are also word sprints which encourage writers to participate in a timed writing challenge, as well as a dare machine that generates creative and silly ideas for the plot and characters. Lastly, there are hundreds of forums for community bonding and fellow writers to pose as sounding boards for others.
Since November is still over half a year away, two writing challenges take place in April and July, called Camp NaNoWriMo. They are very similar to the month in November, with more flexibility when it comes to word count and type of writing. If you want to get ahead on any sort of long-procrastinated writing project, Camp NaNoWriMo is perfect.
Whether cramming a novel into a month produces the best work is up for debate, but this intense experience is certainly worth a try. Many published authors have started their novels with NaNoWriMo, including Marissa Meyer, Rainbow Rowell, and Erin Morgenstern. More importantly, hundreds of people have discovered their skill and love of writing when a simple idea and a drive transformed into a novel.
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