Chris Baty's Blog, page 195

"No matter where you are in your journey as a writer, the editing and notes process remains arduous..."

“No matter where you are in your journey as a writer, the editing and notes process remains arduous and stressful. It will always test you… Be kind to yourself. As hard as it is, try to remember that Rome wasn’t built in a day. Even award-winning authors have to rewrite. A first draft is never the final product.


Don’t give up.”

- Nora Zelevansky on the trials and tribulations of re-writing.

A 7-Step Guide to Big Picture Revision (With Bonus Checklists!)

The “Now What?” Months are here! In 2014, we’ll be bringing you advice from authors who published their NaNo-novels, editors, agents, and more to help you polish November’s first draft until it gleams. Author Wendy Mass guides you through big-picture revision… complete with handy questionnaires :

Ah, revision. My favorite part of the writing process. It’s my favorite because if I’m at this stage, that means I’ve typed “The end.” Even though it’s only the first of many times I’ll write those same words at the end of the same manuscript, it’s still a huge milestone.

You’ve already done the hard part. You put your butt in the chair and wrote a novel! Here’s what comes next:

Insert page numbers and print it out, double-spaced.

Take a deep breath and slowly dive in.

Mark the places that make you laugh or cry.
Mark where you’re bored or confused or where words are repeated too close together.
Note if too many sentences start with “I”,
if there is not enough description or too much,
or if you have too many or too few passages without dialogue.
See if you used ten words when two would do,
notice when you lose track of who’s speaking in a section of dialogue,
or if a character seems to wander into and out of the story without impacting it.
Cross out those passages you meant to delete in the first draft.
And while you’re not really concerned with line editing just now, you will certainly catch small errors.
If you have friends whose opinion you trust, this is a good point in the process to ask them to go through your manuscript with the same objectives in mind. If a few people stumble over the same areas, you know where you need to pay attention. 

Now, go back through the manuscript again and write a list of all the scenes in each chapter and the pages they are on. This isn’t as painful as it sounds.

You only need a few words of description for each section: Electricity goes out (21-24), ring bearer loses the ring (110-111), teacher goes to hospital after swallowing frog (83-86). You get the idea. This will essentially provide an outline of the story.

Here come the highlighters! Look at your list of scenes. Use a different color to highlight each subplot.

Do some of them only show up a few times?
Are some introduced too late in the story?
Are any unresolved?
Do some do nothing to advance or mirror the main plot?

When you are done, anything that is left un-highlighted is your main plotline. Read these over.

Are there holes in the plot?
Would it help build suspense if plot points played out in a different order?
Is there enough of a character arc?
Does the action start too slowly or quickly?
Do you quickly see what it is the character wants, and do they have to overcome enough (evenly-spaced-out) hurdles before reaching a satisfying resolution?

Try to answer these questions, jotting down notes directly on the outline. By the time you’re done crossing out and drawing lines and arrows all over the place, these handwritten pages won’t look pretty. But that’s okay!

Now the fun part—diving back in. With your colorful plot outline by your side, open up your document on the computer. Make corrections and changes as you go. When you are done with this round of revision, re-write the list of scenes so that they reflect the current state of the novel. This will likely look quite different from the first outline.

Now look at the list in a different way. Do some chapters have only three scenes and some have ten? Are some scenes one page long while others are four? This might be okay, or it might indicate that your pacing is off.

If you’re writing for young readers, you will likely want to keep your chapters fairly consistent. Even more seasoned readers may feel pulled out of the story if they sense the pace slowing down or picking up erratically. Look for ways to fix this—sometimes it can be as easy as adjusting the length of the chapters, but you may have to get in there and lengthen or cut some scenes.

Ask yourself if each and every scene moves the plot forward. Does it offer up new, vital information, or new insights into a character? If you feel one section of an otherwise unnecessary scene is important, pull it and find another place in the story to insert it. The rest has gotta go.

It can be hard to say goodbye to a chunk of writing, especially when you’re convinced it’s the best writing you’ve ever done. Paste the passage into another file marked with the title of the book and the word, “Extra”. You can always use it again some day. 

Once this big picture revision is over, you can do it again if you feel your book changed a lot. Otherwise, you’ll be able to start doing line edits. Eventually you’ll get to the point where you’re basically just “prettying it up” which is the name I’ve giving to the process of finding better words, adding colorful descriptions, and amping up the emotion.

During the rough draft process, you were immersed in your story, living inside your imaginary world, breathing life into it through words on a page. Now it’s time to step outside of it and look at it objectively, as though seeing it for the first time. This is where you will turn a whole bunch of scenes piled on top of each other into a single, flowing narrative. Have fun, but take your job seriously.

If all goes according to plan, your tale will end up living in someone else’s head. Respect the reader and do right by them. Always keep in the front of your mind what you are trying to achieve with your story—what you want the reader to come away feeling and thinking. This will guide everything you write. Good luck!

Wendy Mass is the New York Times best-selling author of 14 novels for young people which have been translated into 15 languages. Her most recent books are The Last Present, Pi in the Sky, and the upcoming early reader series Space Taxi.

Top photo by Flickr user Key Foster.

How a Good Editor Amplifies Your Voice

The “Now What?” Months are here! In 2014, we’ll be bringing you advice from authors who published their NaNo-novels, editors, agents, and more to help you polish November’s first draft until it gleams. Author of  Wrong Place, Wrong Time , Tilia Jacobs  explains why you can’t write a novel by yourself… and how to find the right editor :

You need an editor. That story of yours? That you love, that carry around all day and take to bed at night; that story that made you a novelist?

It’s lost.

Well, not lost. Buried. In your manuscript, deep within the jumble of exuberant mediocrity that is a one-month first draft. Fortunately, you know that no one writes a book alone. Witness the acknowledgements section of many a novel; a good editor is a story-magician. But how to find one? And work with one?

Let’s consider your hypothetical editor’s qualifications. He or she needs to be:

a qualified reader/writer; and
willing to tell you the truth.

This narrows the field. Mom and Dad and Aunt Ida, who have had you pegged for a literary genius since you spelled the cat’s name with marbles when you were three can take a powder. Your editor should be an utterly merciless professional.

Michael Marano, a writer and my editor, found his own editor through writers’ conferences and genre conventions.

“Rather than get my stuff looked at by people who were at my level of writing…I wanted to be critiqued by professionals,” he explains. “I found the conferences via listings in writers’ publications and publications specializing in my genres, which you can find in the reference room of your local library.”

When you find an editor, make sure he or she understands your story and how to tell it. If you favor a Hemingway-esque style but your editor has your characters sounding like ambulatory thesauruses; if you have written a Civil War-era historical drama and your editor suggests werewolves; walk away. An editor’s only agenda should be improving your work, not writing through you.

Next, be prepared to embrace two contradictory impulses.

First, bow to your editor’s superior wisdom. 
Second and simultaneously, trust your gut, even if it contradicts your editor.

It’s a balancing act. If your editor never tells you anything new, he or she is not doing his job. If you never accept criticism, you’re not doing yours. But if you agree with your editor 100% of the time, they just might be doing your job.

Whenever I get a manuscript back from Michael, complete with supportive comments (“Aaargh! You know better than this!”), I find that about two thirds of his notes make me exclaim, “Wowza—he is so right!” About a quarter of them make me say, “Well, I don’t agree but I see where he’s coming from.” For the remainder I simply hoot, “Hah! Mike is so wrong!”

And that is a good ratio.

Strive for enough common ground for you to work together, and enough differences that your voice, not your editor’s, comes through. A bad editor makes you sound more like themselves. A good editor makes you sound more like you.

Tilia Klebenov Jacobs holds a Master of Theological Studies from Harvard Divinity School and a Secondary School Teaching Certification from the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Despite lacking the ability to breathe fire except in the strictly metaphorical sense, Tilia has taught middle school, high school, and college. Tilia lives near Boston with her husband, two children, and two standard poodles.

Top photo by Flickr user A. Galassi.

Finding the Right Mix for Your Writing Group

The “Now What?” Months are here! In 2014, we’ll be bringing you advice from authors who published their NaNo-novels, editors, agents, and more to help you polish November’s first draft until it gleams. Author of The Trouble With Mojitos , Romy Sommer  espouses the critical importance of a critique partner… and how to find one :

I was very proud of the first manuscript I ever submitted. The only person who’d laid eyes on it was my mother the English teacher who corrected all the grammar with a red pen. But plot, character development… what were they? That was still back in the days when we submitted via snail mail and the response came the same way. By the time the reply reached me many, many months later I’d learned enough not to be surprised that it was a form rejection.

That rejection sent me off looking for a critique partner who knew a little about romance novels. I met a few through the Harlequin community forums who helped critique my first 1920s novella, Let’s Misbehave, which was later published under a pseudonym by a small ePress, but we all wrote different sub-genres, so we drifted apart.

In 2009, I won NaNoWriMo for the first time with a story I wrote for a contest run by Harlequin. It was through their lively contest blog that I met other entrants—and that was how I found the Minxes of Romance. Or how they found me.

When you find the right mix of personalities you know it. Magic happens when you meet a critique partner who understands what you’re trying to say and who has qualities that complement yours. I was lucky to meet eight of them. In our group, some are stronger at critiquing conflict or character development, some are better at sharpening wording or correcting grammar. Together, we are a powerhouse.

When we met, three of us had sold to the same small ePress. All of us were targeting bigger publishers. Four years later, we are published by HarperCollins, DC Thompson, Entangled Press and Harlequin. That only happened because of the support and help we gave each other.

We critique each others’ work less these days, but we still bounce ideas off each other, and we still share support and encouragement. Because that’s what best friends do.

A critique partner is an essential accessory on your path to publication. Whether you meet over coffee to swap chapters or whether you only connect online, whether you have one trusted partner or join a group of complementary talents, is up to you. For me, being part of a group has worked well because even when one of us is on a deadline and hiding out in the writing cave, there’s always someone else available to chat.

The right critique partner, that person who brings magic to your writing and who becomes a friend beyond the written word, is worth the wait. Persevere until you meet that person. But don’t delay! Get started meeting people today.

Join your local writers’ group or search Google for groups of like-minded writers. Read the blogs of other aspiring writers, or find them on Twitter or Facebook (my publisher, Harper Impulse, has a very active Facebook page where you can meet other romance readers and writers). Or join the NaNoWriMo forums, if you haven’t already.

I’m a romance writer, so a belief in Happy Endings is a given. I just know that the perfect partner (or partners!) is out there for you. You simply need to go out and mingle.

Romy Sommer is the author of The Trouble With Mojitos , and Waking Up In Vegas . By day, she dresses in cargo pants and boots for her not-so-glamorous job of making movies but at night she comes home to two little Princesses, and writes Happily Ever Afters. Though her heart lies in Europe, she’s not too good with the cold, so she lives in sunny South Africa.

Top photo by Flickr user Opedagogen.

When to Listen to Your Readers... And When to Ignore Them

The “Now What?” Months are here! In 2014, we’ll be bringing you advice from authors who published their NaNo-novels, editors, agents, and more to help you polish November’s first draft until it gleams. Author Laurel Snyder  shares how to best hear criticism from your first-readers :

Once a little girl asked me this question: “How do you figure out when to listen to other people, and when to listen to yourself?”

I think this was perhaps the wisest thing anyone has ever asked me, and I was utterly stumped. But it’s something we all need to think about, and be prepared for, as we revisit our NaNoWriMo manuscripts, isn’t it? Because whether you’re turning to an online critique group, a teacher, or an old friend, your next step will probably involve getting someone else to read what you’ve written. Someone who can help you figure out what that pile of words is going to become.

The impulse to send your book out into the world can be strong. You’ve worked hard, and you want someone to appreciate that fact, and see a diamond in the rough. Probably you harbor vague dreams that someone might actually say, “I don’t know how you did it, but it’s perfect just as it is. Don’t change a word!”

The thing is that whatever they’re going to say, you won’t be ready to hear it, or to gauge your own reaction to it, if you haven’t gotten some distance first. Wait until you can’t quite remember the book, and then send it off. To a trusted reader who will be honest, but kind.

Then try to find a very calm, confident place inside yourself, before you listen to whatever your reader is going to say. Because it can be hard to hear an honest critique, and even harder to figure out what to do with it.

Going back to the little girl with the brilliant question—you are going to need to decide when to listen, and when to ignore. In my experience, that has less to do with whether you think your reader is right or wrong, and more to do with how you respond emotionally to the very subjective opinion they offer.

There is no right or wrong in writing a book. There is only a puzzle, a question, of exactly what book you’re writing. This process of hearing critique will be a kind of divining rod. You’ll use the knee-jerks you experience to figure out what advice to keep, and what to throw away.

And here is the thing—the stronger you react negatively to something your reader says—the closer they are to a nerve. This doesn’t mean you need to do what they say. But it means your reader is in the vicinity of something that you know, deep in your heart, to be a flaw (or maybe an opportunity) in the manuscript.

That is what you’re hunting for. Those moments of resistance in yourself. If your reader thinks your main character is boring, and you resist that comment, you need to figure out why. If your reader thinks that the end of your book isn’t believable, and you want to shout, “Then you aren’t reading it the right way,” you need to be a witness to your own shouts. Nobody else can tell you how to write your book. But the way you respond to comments can be a roadmap.

Often, I jerk my own knee, shout at my agent, argue my well-reasoned point, and then, hours later call back, sheepish. To say, “I’m sorry I wasn’t listening very well. I don’t think you were exactly right, but I do need to work on that, don’t I?”

Don’t listen to other people. Listen to you listening to other people. You may need to rewind that conversation periodically, and process it in your head, over and over. But you’ll get there. Anyway, you’ll get somewhere.

Writing takes a lot of confidence and energy. Revising takes humility and calm. Good luck finding it!

Yours in words,

Laurel Snyder

Laurel is the author of many books for kids (and a few for adults), including Baxter, the Pig Who Wanted to Be Kosher , Bigger than a Bread Box , and a brand new middle grade novel, Seven Stories Up . She lives in Atlanta. Drop her a line on Twitter!

Top photo by Flickr user abrinsky.

What to Keep When Editing Requires a Reset

The “Now What?” Months are here! In 2014, we’ll be bringing you advice from authors who published their NaNo-novels, editors, agents, and more to help you polish November’s first draft until it gleams. Author Cristina Alger tells us what to do when editing requires mass-deletion :

“So what did you think of my manuscript?”

“It was good.” Jenn smiled at as she took a sip of her coffee. And then, after a pause: “Have you ever heard the term ‘updraft’?”

I shook my head.

“An updraft is a basically a rough first draft, in which the author is just getting ideas onto the page. The term comes from throwing up. As in, you sort of just throw up on to a page. An updraft.” She smiled again.

I nodded, speechless. Had she just compared my manuscript to throw up? I was prepared to hear that my manuscript was boring, or badly written, or otherwise unpublishable. Frankly, I was grateful that Jenn, a well-known agent at a well-known literary agency, had bothered to read it at all and was willing to give me feedback. But … throw up?

“It’s not as bad as it sounds,” Jenn said. “Most writers go through this process. You throw up onto the page. You go back and see what sticks. Then you rewrite.”

“So basically, you’re telling me that none of this is worth saving? I have to start over?”

I looked at the manuscript in my hands: nearly 100,000 words of material that was now destined for the recycling bin. My heart felt like it had been ripped out of my chest.

“Not at all,” she shook her head. “That’s not what I’m saying. Look, I think what you should do is put this in a drawer for a while. Two weeks, a month, whatever. Then, when you feel like you have some distance, go back and re-read it with a critical eye. You might find that while you have some great ideas in there, characters or themes or relationships that are worth salvaging, most of the text itself has to go. And that’s okay. Text is not sacred. Do not fear the Delete button. I hate to see writers wasting their time to save paragraphs or chapters when it would be easier and less time-consuming to just re-write them. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

I nodded dumbly, though inside I was crushed. Still, I took her advice. I put the manuscript in the drawer. A month later, I took it out, poured myself a large glass of wine, and began to read. And I saw exactly what she meant.

My first draft was poorly plotted. It read more like a series of short stories than one cohesive novel. I hadn’t used an outline the first time around, and it showed. I also hadn’t found my voice. The first quarter of the manuscript was written in a self-conscious, overly labored prose, while the last quarter felt much cleaner and more streamlined. On the plus side, I loved my characters. I loved how the book took place in a tight time frame—over a matter of days. And I loved the descriptions of New York and the Hamptons.

Characters. Time frame. Setting.

I forced myself to sit down and write an outline, based on those three ingredients. Once I was done, I began again, on a fresh Word document with the daunting word count of zero.

A year later, the second draft was done. This was the draft I submitted to agents—Jenn among them—and later, to editors. Almost none of the text of the first draft remained. Once my editor at Penguin purchased the book, she handed me a list of comments—ranging from minute to structural—and the process began again.

By the time the book hit the shelves, I had written the equivalent of four books, maybe five. At least 500,000 words, 420,000 of which would never see the light of day.

I’m working on the first draft of my second novel now. Knowing that most—if not all—of it will end up in the trash is strangely freeing. Instead of editing as I go, I’m just trying to get the whole story down on paper. When I’m done, I plan to put it in a drawer and leave it there for at least a couple weeks. And then, I will pour myself a large glass of wine and get ready to start deleting.

Cristina Alger is a writer, a former corporate lawyer, and a lifelong New Yorker. Her first novel, The Darlings , was published in 2012 by Penguin/Viking Press. She is at work on her second novel.

Top photo by Flickr user permutatedSilver.

4 Ways to Grow A Newborn Novel

The “Now What?” Months are here! In 2014, we’ll be bringing you advice from authors who published their NaNo-novels, editors, agents, and more to help you polish November’s first draft until it gleams. Marivi Soliven shares four steps she took to publishing her book, The Mango Bride :

Maybe you woke up on December 1, sleep-deprived but exhilarated over birthing your novel. What now? You can bury it in a folder or grow that NaNo-newborn into a novel fit for publication. That’s what I did.

I plunged into NaNoWriMo 2008 to overcome my life-long phobia of novel writing. After self-congratulation got old, I did a reality check: of my 50,000 words, only 26—all in the first sentence—were any good. The rest wallowed in histrionic dialogue and sordid drama. 

NaNoWriMo was a mad sprint, but if you’re ready for the long slow slog of rewrites, here are a few ways to grow your newborn novel into a book:

Seek Feedback via Writing Groups

Still, a decent plot lay beneath that flabby text and that kept me going.
I threw out everything but that first sentence and started over. Sensing it would take a village to raise this child, I joined a read-and-critique group that forced me to write two chapters each month for two years.

Write Daily

In addition to a NaNoWriMo-initiated habit of writing daily from 6 to 8 AM, I commenced typing on my laptop at every free moment: by the skating rink, between calls at the day job, on long road trips as my husband drove.

Open Up to Serendipity

Writing on the fly led to serendipitous encounters that fed my novel. Once while seeking somewhere to write while my daughter was at ballet, surreal violin music drew me to oddly dressed buskers in Balboa Park. Thoth wore a black skirt and anklet bells, and his partner Lila’Angelique was a confection of pink organza. Instead of abandoning the novel to listen, I wrote the duo known as Tribal Baroque into that afternoon’s chapter.

Attend Classes to Hone Your Craft

Whenever possible, I took classes to nudge the novel closer to publication. Literary Agent Taryn F. showed us how to compose effective query letters. Novelist Drusilla C. revealed the trick to writing cliff-hanger chapter endings. Another writer explained how to discern when the novel was done.

By December 2010, my novel was done. I pitched it to Taryn using a query letter modeled on the one she’d taught us to write. By then Taryn negotiated foreign language rights exclusively, but she endorsed the novel to Jill M., who signed me for literary representation. Jill submitted the manuscript to multiple publishers and landed a contract with Penguin in April 2011. In August, the unpublished novel won a Palanca Award, the Philippine version of the Pulitzer prize.

Guided by my Penguin editor, I revised, copy-edited, and proofread until the manuscript had grown into publishable novel. The Mango Bride was released on April 30, 2013. My bi-coastal book tour has covered eight states and stretched across the Pacific Ocean to the Philippines, and a movie deal is in the works. It took nearly five years to get from draft to book but the wait was worth it.

Marivi Soliven has taught writing workshops at the University of the Philippines and the University of California at San Diego. Stories and essays from her 15 books have appeared in numerous anthologies and creative writing texts in Manila. Her debut novel, The Mango Bride , was published by Penguin in April 2013. She has successfully completed two rounds of Nanowrimo and happily recommends it to anyone who loves— or fears—writing.

Top photo by Flickr user Harold Groven.

You Wrote a Novel! Now What?, or: National Novel Editing Months

Maybe you wrote a novel last year. Maybe you happened to write that novel during November. Maybe you let that novel sit all through December, letting your brain clear and are feeling freshly rejuvenated.

It’s time to edit that novel.

All through January, we’ll be providing editing challenges, tips, advice, and guidance from your friendly neighborhood writing nonprofit (that’s us!), and publishing professionals.

Then, in February, we’re going to get real about publishing. Traditional publishing still appears as the holy grail (and we’ll get advice from agents, authors, and more!), but we explore self-publishing and its incredible successes and strides… and just how to start your own publishing journey.

Ready to join us? Reblog this post, then go to the website and earn your editing commitment badge by signing this contract.

We’re also hosting webinars from:

The Book Doctors
Guy Kawasaki
Wattpad
and more!

We’ll also host a Tweetchat with:

Kimberley Young, an editorial director at HarperImpulse
All the agents and assistants at New Leaf Literary Agency

And of course, regular blog content full of editing and publishing tips and tricks from authors, including:

Renee Ahdieh
Karen Harrington
Liz Coley
Marivi Soliven
Melissa Landers
and more!

Farewell to NaNoWriMo 2013: Our Beloved Interns on Continuing the Creative Journey

Steve Genise, Development Intern: 

I guess I’ll start off simply. It’s been incredible interning here. It was incredible to be at the Night of Writing Dangerously and compare opinions on chainmail construction.  It was incredible to get to do my famous portrayal of Ophelia during the virtual write-ins. It was incredible to spend an entire day putting address labels on annual reports to be mailed. (And no, that’s not sarcasm.  The office aspect is all part of the package, and I dig that, too.)

But most importantly, it was incredible to be a part of this entire event. I’ve done NaNoWriMo before; sometimes I’ve won, sometimes I’ve lost, and this time, I lost hardcore. And you know what? That’s okay with me. Even though I didn’t reach that 50K mark, this was by far the best NaNoWriMo I’ve ever had.

Before this, I had never really participated in the NaNo community.  I hadn’t gone to write-ins or communicated with fellow Wrimos online; NaNo for me was always a solo trek. But after this internship, I really discovered what the NaNoVerse is all about: family. This November, the office was my family, the East Bay Region was my family, Wrimos as far away as Iceland that I got to speak with were my family, and that was really something above and beyond anything I had ever experienced during Novembers past.

And as much as I am going to miss this office and the people that work here, in no way am I leaving behind my NaNo Family. Really, it’s all around me, no matter where I go. I’ll be living in Germany next year, and my NaNo Family will be there with me. I could move to Kenya the next year, and my NaNo Family would be there, too. Wrimos exist on literally every continent on Earth (including Antarctica, if you’re wondering). I could move anywhere and there would be a 100% chance that I was among friends.

And the best part of it is you don’t have to work here to get that experience. That’s how it happened for me, sure, but that’s by no means the only way. If there’s anything I learned while interning here, it’s that if you are like me, if NaNo is a solo venture, if you’re a one-man wolf pack, a lone warrior, maybe try getting in touch with the community. We really are all a family—all 321,392 of us.

Lauren Harsma, Programs Intern: 

In the past three months, Sir Percival, whom you may remember from my intro post, has developed (and beta-tested) impressive peanut butter radar. He shed 50,000 hairs and learned the Foxtrot.

While my library of dance moves and ability to locate food using only my nose are still sorely lacking, I also accomplished a few things: I saved my laptop from a watery grave, wrote 50,000 words, and learned how to brew coffee in a French press by learning how not to brew coffee in a French press. (It’s always a good sign when my learning curve is on par with my dog’s.)

Percy may have a contract with Barnum & Bailey and a starring role in a Pantene commercial, but I had an internship at National Novel Writing Month, and that’s worth more than a hill of beans (coffee, mostly, if you were wondering).

Thanks to NaNo, I now know what 400 donuts looks like. I know how heavy a dinosaur is, and where to get the best Creole food in Berkeley. I know how Twitter works; I know the value of a great Halloween costume; I know what it’s like to have a job I positively adore, what it’s like to work with people who are as passionate about what they do at the office as they are about what they do outside of it.

I know that my decision to work here, impetuous and ill-advised as it was, was a good one.

Having creative control over a couple of absolutely wonderful projects and being trusted to come up with good ideas—being expected to come up with good ideas—was wonderful. I spent every day imagining, problem-solving, making suggestions—I was hired to spreadsheet and speculate.

It was refreshing and rewarding in a way a normal desk job isn’t, to be able to use my brain like that. I pictured it stretching, taffy-pulled, bright and sweet and totally worthwhile, and I knew that all the time and all the sleep and all the money I was giving up to be here was completely and utterly worth it. Recalibrating myself to the real world is going to suck.

But it’s going to be okay, because I have a big hill of coffee beans and cocoa beans and NaNo beans to get me through it. (Also, if anyone’s interested in investing in a polar bear farm in Alaska, call me. I greatly underestimated the cost of ringed seal.)

Come Write In Anywhere! Anna Sander on Making History and Tea

Our Come Write In program has partnered with bookstores and libraries around the world for four years. This November, for the first time, we welcomed community spaces of all kinds to become novel-writing havens. In this year’s final installment of Come Write In Anywhere, intern Steve Genise talks with Oxford’s Balliol College curator Anna Sander about balancing NaNoWriMo with the intensity of school:

Anna, thank you so much for speaking with me! Has Balliol College ever hosted a NaNoWriMo event in the past?

This is the first time Balliol has hosted a NaNo event. We’ve made history! But I decided against inspecting their notebooks to see whether they were writing a novel or tackling a thesis chapter.

Hey, words are words. How do your students deal with the sleeplessness of going to such a prestigious university while participating in NaNoWriMo?

I have no idea how Oxford students manage to do all they do—I wasn’t a student here, and my post isn’t a teaching one. I don’t think they sleep during termtime. At all. It’s a good thing the terms are short and most BA courses are 3 years.

I’m not a big sleeper myself.  Here in America we tend to drink Red Bull to keep us going during NaNo. Is it true that Oxford only allows students to drink tea on campus?

Well, Oxford doesn’t have a campus, but there are plenty of places in town and in the colleges to get tea, coffee, various brands of cold high-caffeine drinks, and all manner of alcohol. The latter is not recommended for staying sharp during revision or novel writing, though! 

Our college library runs Tuesday Tea & Biscuits breaks for stressed-out final-year students leading up to final exams, and in a departure from the usual regulations banning all food and drink, the kettle was definitely on and the biscuit tin open at St. Cross for NaNoWriMo sessions.

Now lastly, and most importantly: who will win the 2014 Boat Race? I’m somewhat of a rower, myself, and I’ve got a lot of money invested. (For our readers who are unaware, the Oxford-Cambridge Boat Race is super awesome, and takes place every April)

Since you’re asking someone whose email address ends in .ox.ac.uk, there is only one possible answer: of course Oxford will win the 2014 Boat Race!

I guess we’ll be speaking in April then.  Thank you so much!

Anna Sander is the archivist and manuscript curator at Balliol College, Oxford, has a totally awesome job title, and underestimates the potential of the 2014 Cambridge blue boat.  Read her blog about the Balliol NaNoWriMo adventure here!