Guest Post: MJ Fredrick – NaNoWriMo Hints

Both Sunrise and Road Signs were not plotted ahead of time. In fact, I came up with the idea for Sunrise three days before NaNoWriMo! This year I’ve plotted a little more, enough to fire me up.

Here are some of my survival tips for NaNoWriMo:

*Clear your plate. I spent October revising like crazy so I could focus on writing new pages beginning November 1.

*Find your prime writing time. Mine is REALLY early. I write a few hundred words before I go to work.

* Sign up on the NaNoWriMo page and find friends. I am apparently very competitive, and push myself when I see someone has bypassed me. I’ve never done the local gatherings or write-ins, but some people find that fun and helpful.

*When you’re stuck, try http://writeordie.drwicked.com/. You write without pausing, or the screen will start flashing. One thing I don’t like is that it messes up your formatting when you cut and paste it into your document.

*Don’t be afraid to skip scenes. Just write (TRANSITION SCENE HERE) or (LOVE SCENE HERE) and keep going. Same with names. I forget character’s names and write WHATSISNAME.

I love the pure focus on writing that NaNoWriMo allows. Writing rough drafts is my favorite part of the process, and though I know there will be work for me when November is done, I can’t wait to get started.

Two of my Carina Press books, Sunrise Over Texas (September 2010) and Road Signs (March 2011), are NaNoWriMo success stories. I wrote Sunrise in November 2008 and Road Signs in November 2009. I’d done NaNoWriMo two years before—writing one manuscript that was a lot of fun, but a MESS when I was done, and one I plotted but barely eeked out 50,000 words.

MJ Fredrick knows about chasing dreams. Twelve years after she completed her first novel, she signed her first publishing contract. Now she divides her days between teaching music in the elementary school, and diving into her own writing—traveling everywhere in her mind, from Belize to Honduras to Africa to the past.