Hey all you NaNoWriMo writers! How was the first week?! Have you met your personal goals in writing your novel? Here are some tips and resources I picked up last year when I participated — plus I’d love to hear about your NaNoWriMo progress!

Moleskine Ruled Notebook Pocket, $12.00 from Amazon

Always carry around a small notebook and pen. I found this crucial when I was riding the train or in the middle of lunch and I thought of a good idea for the novel – I just jotted it down in my notebook until I could get back to my document and add it in. By the end of the month, that notebook was full of notes. Some of them I used, some of them were better left alone. I would sometimes even wake up in the morning with an idea and need to write it down. You never know when you’ll get inspired! Above is one of my favorite brands of notebooks.

 

Last year, I found tons of DeviantArt NaNoWriMo calendars, and I printed one out that I especially liked and then self-laminated it. You know, when you take scotch tape and wrap it row by row around a piece of paper? Yep, self-laminated. Anyway, they usually come with a word count goal for each day segmented into the 1,667 words/day goal cumulatively. Others also have fun ideas to get the writing flow going if you’re stuck!

I particularly liked the simplicity of this calendar by DeviantArt user Chisaku. It’s also a desktop calendar for your computer! You can do a search on DeviantArt for “NaNoWriMo” and you’ll have your choice of calendars!

Distraction-free writing! Last year, when I found myself staring at my text document and idly switching over to the Internet — I was losing precious productivity time! I decided to use a program called Write or Die. The program is intense, which is why I only used it when I felt myself losing my abilities to focus. Basically, you set a time or word goal for yourself like 30 minutes of straight writing or 1500 words. You set a consequence based on a grace period. If you STOP typing, for say 30 seconds, based on the harshness of the consequence you set for yourself you’ll either get a pop-up to make you keep writing, a loud and annoying sound will start on your computer or your work will start unwriting itself before your eyes!

This program is no joke! (I chuckled when I realized it was impossible to select the ‘Electric Shock Mode.’) Write or Die really helped me get some good writing time in, though. It’ll jolt you right out of any writer’s block you may be experiencing! The actual program is $10, but I used the web application, which is free. The only thing you have to remember is to copy/paste out your work to your actual document and save.


So, catch me up on your progress, NaNoWriMo-writing Lovelies! How’s it going? Do you have any tips to share with the rest of us? Any software you prefer?

I hope it’s going well for everyone and I can’t wait to hear!

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