The dawn of week two of can be a beast. The adrenaline has worn off and you might be feeling a little winded here — perhaps you’ve hit around 15,000 words and have no idea what happens next in your story. You’re thinking, Three more weeks of this? and banging your head against the keyboard in agony.
Hang. In. There.
Our friends at procured some inspiring advice from novelists. Some of our top picks:
“One of my favorite aphorisms on writing is: Just get the clay on the table. There’ll be plenty of time to read over the draft and fix everything that needs fixing WHEN THE FIRST DRAFT IS DONE. Some tips for doing that? Set goals for every writing session. Have less time? Lower the goal. But do set them and work hard to reach them. Make them public if you need to. Tell someone else, to make it a personal challenge. Or set up #1k1hr challenges (1,000 words in an hour) with other writers on Twitter or elsewhere.” -Bradley P. Beaulieu, author of the series
“Writing exercise: Make a list of your ten favorite books and/or movies, then write down what you think the theme of each story is. You may find that your opinion differs from your friends, critics, or even the avowed intentions of the author or screenwriter, but that doesn’t really matter. The point of the exercise is to get your mind attuned to considering theme as the underpinning of your story.”
-Anthony Ryan, author of
“Be ambitious, be disciplined — but never lose sight of your own idiosyncratic, personal joy in a story well told. Nurture that and share that. It’s the most precious tool in the box. We’re in this to sustain reader’s hearts, if we can. To have a shot at doing so we must sustain our own.”
-Robert V.S. Redick, author of
Read more great NaNoWriMo advice .
And the next best thing to having a coach right there in the room with you is to listen to one of these classic books on writing whenever you take breaks to make coffee, eat, and take walks (which you must remember to do):
