may the odds be ever in your favor

The beautiful month of October draws to a close today. In Celtic tradition, if I remember correctly, today also marks the end of the year, which in some ways seems more fitting to me than December 31. The trees, having celebrated the bounty of harvest and the changing seasons with an unbelievable cacophony of colors, now stand nearly bare. Yes, let's begin the year with cleansing snow. God plants in the autumn, after all.

For some of us, tomorrow heralds in something entirely different--a month-long sprint of insanity, you could say. Some of you are eyeing your keyboard or pen with anticipation and something akin to fear, and you know exactly what I'm hinting at. Others of you are wary of the acronym I'm about to type, and may even be ready to unfollow any blog on which you read it, for fear of being overwhelmed by writing updates disguised by incomprehensible flailing in the coming weeks.

NaNoWriMo. I think I knew all year that I would do it, yet the decision to participate in my second National Novel Writing Month still came with some uncertainty. Do I really have the time? No less than I did last year, I suppose! I still plan to trudge forward with my reading challenge--I read before bed to wind down, so writing won't affect that--and I promise that I won't write another NaNo-centered post until the end, when I will probably do a wrap-up post. Before last year, I became very tired of seeing "NaNoWriMo" plastered on blogs every November, so I try to strike a balance with my own blog now that I participate in this madness.

I'm working on the same book again this year, since I haven't hardly touched it since last November, when I wrote about 26,000 words. My working title is The Hippogriff, and after "pantsing" my first NaNo, I scribbled out a skeleton of an outline a few weeks ago in hopes that I can get the story moving forward.

Being a slow writer, and not wanting to greatly affect my normal responsibilities, I'm also keeping my same humble goal of 25,000 words. Some may say that I'm not a true NaNoer if I don't aim for the full 50,000, but I say that while it's good to stretch yourself, it's also important to respect your limitations.

Speaking of limitations, I currently live in a yurt(!), so my access to electricity (not to mention internet) is a bit limited. This means, of course, that unlike last year, I will be writing my novel by hand over the coming weeks. Who knows . . . maybe I'll find that I prefer it this way!

If you're also doing NaNoWriMo this year (or if you're simply interested in more frequent updates), please add me as a friend on the NaNo website or follow me on Twitter! Good luck, and happy writing!

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From the Editor's Desk {Tip of the Week}

spacing

How many times should you hit "enter" after a paragraph, or the space bar at the end of a sentence? If you're writing a manuscript, the answer to both questions is "once." There should never be two spaces between sentences, and paragraphs should be indented, not separated by a blank line.

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Are you participating in NaNoWriMo? If so, what is your book about? If not, how do you feel about blogs that post constant writing updates throughout the month of November?