It’s almost November, and National Novel Writing Month is just around the corner. Check out the NaNo Site .

I’ve participated in, and won, NaNo for the past two years. In 2004, I ended up with a novel that i still think is promising. It’s the one I’ve been editing for the past weeks. In 2005 I finished with about 60,000 words of swill. That’s how it goes.

If you’ve never participated, then it’s a great chance to get a rough draft (or most of one) in a very short time. Although 50,000 words isn’t really novel length, it’s certainly a great start. I’ve also learned that the speedy writing allows plot twists to develop that I’d never have considered and reveals character traits I’d never thought of.

Here are some tips for finishing NaNo, in no particular order.

1. Write every day. I know that’s an obvious one, but you really have to write every, single day. It’s very easy to fall behind, and you can quickly lose enough ground that you won’t even be able to dream of catching up.
2. You don’t need a block of time in which to write. You may want a block of time, and you’ll need to carve out writing time in your schedule, but you can squeeze some writing in virtually anywhere. Write while you’re waiting to pick up the kids, eating lunch, on hold on the phone. You get the idea. You’ll boost your word count, but more importantly, you’ll train yourself to fall into "writing mode" much more quickly.
3. Don’t edit. At all. Ever. Not even a little bit. Once you fall into the editing trap, you’ll waste precious time when you shouid be writing. You’re not shooting for a publishable work in one month. Think ROUGH DRAFT. Once you fall into the editing trap, you’re likely to never find your way out. You have been warned.
4. Don’t despair. No one said you have to write a great novel in one month, or even a good one. You want to write a novel, just a novel, in one month (as is that weren’t enough). Don’t stress yourself about its quality; you’re too close to the process to be any judge of the quality anyway. Write, and worry about reworking the novel later.
5. Enjoy yourself. Writing a novel in a month is hard work, but it’s also lots of fun. Why do you think thousands of crazy ambitious people do this every November?

If you’re doing NaNo and blogging about it, leave your blog address in the comments and I’ll link to you. I’d appreciate it if you’d reciprocate.