Monday, 2 March 2009

NaNoEdMo

May I have a few extra hours? That would be great. One more every day for sleeping in, a couple for hanging out with my boyfriend and other friends, and of course an extra two hours or so every night for writing. Plus a few more hours during the weekend would be just spiffy.

But that's OK. I can make it fit. I'm recovered from last week, and am happily looking forward to all the extra moolah I earned with my overtime.

This month I'd really like to complete NaNoEdMo (Editing Month — fifty hours of editing time), simply because I want to get two of my NaNoWriMo novels finished (just a first draft — but I want the stories finished, no skipped scenes or cut-off endings). Getting a first draft is one step closer to getting a novel ready to be submitted to a publisher, though I'm starting to doubt I can get that done in time for my 101 deadline — 18 February 2010. That's less than a year away, and I haven't yet finished the first draft, let alone reworked, rewritten, rewritten again, edited, line-edited, shown to test readers, rewritten again, line-edited again....

Still, that's a few steps down the road for me yet. For now, focus on the next: fifty hours of editing in March. (And painting the house on the good days. The breakfast bar is now nearly finished, thanks to the rainy weather on the weekend making exterior work impossible.)

But ye gods, fifty hours in March — that's nearly two hours a day. I don't think I actually have that amount of time. And you can't exactly push yourself to do it faster like you can with NaNoWriMo.

I don't go into NaNoEdMo aiming to succeed. Just hoping to get closer to my personal goal: finishing the first draft of one itty bitty novel.

2 comments:

Kerryn Angell said...

I totally agree that NaNoEdMo is much more time dependent that WriMo. I'm aiming for 22 hours rather than the 50 because I've just got too much else to fit in without getting stressed.

Kiwi Writers has a 20 hour editing challenge for March here: http://www.kiwiwriters.org/my/challenge/member/evil-editors-unite.html

Ruth (Book Focus) said...

Ooh, thanks! I might sign up for that one instead. :) Twenty hours sounds a lot more sane!