NaNoWriMo 2010 - Day 5

[ladyseishou]

Day 5 - 25 days remaining

I do a first draft as passionately and as quickly as I can.
I believe a story is valid only when it's immediate and passionate,
when it dances out of your subconscious.

If you interfere in any way, you destroy it.

- Ray Bradbury



A popular writing aid that is a favorite for many Wrimos is Dr. Wicked's web site: Write or Die, a particularly fiendish creation wherein you type in a word count goal and a time and start to write. Simple enough, right?

Well the catch is that if you stop writing there are evil consequences that range from annoying pop-ups that remind you to keep writing to a mode that will actually erase your hard work if you dally too long.

I think what work bests about this method is the incentive it provides to keep you writing, that the fear (or annoyance) of "punishment" actually acts to beat down the voice in your head that urges you to stop, rewrite, rethink, redo... In other words, it helps you help yourself to kill your "inner editor" so that the words of your story can flow, immediate and raw, passionate and real.

And there will be typos. For me, lots of typos. And your characters may not stick with your original outline, change sex, and adopt a new point of view. But if you give them the chance, who knows what new really cool stuff you'll discover?

Today's Word Count: 8,333! Did you beat it? Tell us about it! Excerpts? Questions? Frustrations? Amusing typos?

...Keep Writing!

Comments

[delwyn_cole]

Wow, I should do that more often. Set the time at two hours, and wrote 5,192 words on the normal punishment but strict grace period. That put my total word count at 11,476, and I'm nearly back on track for the 100k that I'm attempting this year. I'm going to try to get another couple hours of work done, but probably not at quite the breakneck pace that Write or Die forced out of me.

Plot stayed mostly on track, though I think I managed to pick up a subplot I hadn't been thinking about, and I swear that one of my secondary characters is in love with the MC. That wouldn't be a problem if the MC weren't straight and married and the secondary character not only not his wife, but a guy. Oh well, should provide some tension, especially as Stephen (MC) genuinely likes Sender (secondary character). It would probably help if Stephen stopped flirting back, though.

[ladyseishou]

A fantastic word count! It certainly seems that Write or Die works for you! And a bonus subplot! And yeah, unrequited love is a great source of tension - popped up in my story unexpectedly too!