It's that time of year again when writers around the world try to kick their monthly word count goals into high gear for National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). As someone who has reached 50,000 words in the month of November three times before, my goals have been more modest in recent years. Now I approach NaNoWriMo like someone who joins a gym in January: to reach short-term goals if I can, but also to develop better habits that will hopefully last beyond the month.
Last year, I used NaNoWriMo to add about 20,000 words to my YA zombie apocalypse novel, Hopeless. This year, I'm working on its sequel, and I hope to emulate the writing schedule that led to the publication of Hopeless in June. To reach that goal, I'd ideally finish 40,000 words by the end of November. I've written about 20,000 so far, which means my NaNoWriMo goal this year is another 20,000 words.
Since I wrote 20,000 words last November, I'm cautiously optimistic that I'll be able to reach the goal again this year. As always, I'll report on how I did at the end of NaNoWriMo. Wish me luck!
