Have a novel in you?

Don’t cripple it by trying to write it in a month! Even the venerable NY Times (yes, the newspaper that often has its names attached to “bestseller” in some arcane and suspicious indication of quality) bought into NaNoWriMo, or “National Novel Writing Month.” The challenge (and it belies the name a bit): Write a novel in a month. The best I can say about that nonsense is that it might motivate someone to get started writing. The worst? Continue on.

Most of you know I’ve written a few novels. I’v...