chasing bawa

Yup, that’s the official Nanowrimo 2009 winner’s logo up there. Well done to everyone who participated, whether you reached the goal of 50K or not. The fact that you tried is something to be proud of!

I have to admit this year was a bit of a toughie. I had two great ideas, one was a murder mystery (set in the late 1920s) and the other literary fiction (angst, complexes, feminism, you name it) and opted for the former as I thought it would be easier to outline and less vague, and I get to revisit my favourite character from Nano 2006. Well, I had my victim, the murderer was one out of three possibilities and I had an outline which had the first three points and the conclusion. Not a great start. And on top of that, I couldn’t write on the first day. And on the second day, I went straight home from work, set everything up to start writing and went to bed an hour early. What?? I hear you say. Exactly my response.

So I pretty much struggled the whole way. It wasn’t that I couldn’t write 1667 words a day. I find that if I give myself two hours every day I can normally complete my daily word count, but this year I just thought a lot more about the substance of what I was writing. Not the quality because that is something you can revise and improve, and it is a first draft after all, but substance. Whether what I was writing was meaningful to me and to my story. I didn’t really think about that the last three times I did Nano because I was enjoying myself too much and it actually turned out pretty well. And Nano is really about enjoying yourself and enjoying writing.

I guess this year somehow my heart wasn’t in it. But I’m glad I did it because it showed me that I can actually sit down and write. So all I need to do is to keep up this habit of putting aside some time every day to write. Anyway, I plan to keep on at this story just to see where it will go and whether I can settle on a murderer. And I’ll be reading more books about the creative habit and writing. Wish me luck!