Who Wrote That?

This year I have bitten the bullet and signed up for NaNoWriMo, National Novel Writing Month if you haven't heard of it before. For the month of November, writers set themselves the task of writing a 50,000 word novel in 30 days.

NaNoWriMo doesn't expect the month will produce the greatest works of modern day, far from it. The pressure isn't to turn out a Booker Prize winning tome, but rather an injection of 'just do it'. Don't over think, don't over plan, just write.

I have wanted to do this for years but always talked myself out of it. I have a fews of problems when it comes to writing which it has taken me until now to get over, and in truth I am not truly over them, more on top of them in a failed leapfrog jump.

1 Guilt, oh the guilt of sitting and writing when I could be something 'proper' and 'productive'. This also seeps into my work life, my frivolous life of PR when I had the grades to do something worthwhile like medicine. The answer is...write about guilt, well it may as well have a use...

2 Who the hell do I think I am? I mean writers are special aren't they? They are either born writers or have been through some amazing course of study in drafty old Universities. They hang out together, they are a clique. Go on twitter - turns out some of the most successful writers are actually quite normal.

3 It isn't going to be War and Peace, is it? Well, is that a bad thing? But, whatever I churn out is going to be lightweight I imagine. I'd love to write something powerful and literary but Newsnight revue aren't going to gush over me, The Times Literary Supplement aren't going to kiss my feet. What if I produce something which is, gulp, throw away? Well so what? Sometimes you want a burger not a fillet steak.

And so today is NaNoWriMo Day Five. In the previous 4 days I have written 7,602 words. This is now 7,500 more words of fiction than I have ever written before. Oddly I love it. I have a rough idea of the storyline, and every evening I just, you know, write a bit. Characters pop up, like those people you met once on holiday and pop round expecting dinner six years later. Who the hell are these people? I don't know but they seeped out of my brain and now they're here...

I don't know whether I'll hit the 50k mark, but just 4 short days has changed my outlook irrevocably. I'm using my time so much better - my other work is actually more organised. There is time in the day to write and I can do it, and right now it doesn't matter if it is crap. And when I turn the computer off, I feel relaxed.

I was given some brilliant advice by Carrie Quinlan at a workshop this year, which I think I am going to print out and put by my computer:

Don't get it right, get it written.