Sign Up For The Next Novel Push Initiative!

I just finished participating in a Novel Push Initiative being hosted by Merrilee Faber at Not Enough Words.  For 3 weeks, I wrote every day, even on the weekends when I usually don’t.  My final word count was 13,746, which is not shabby for 21 days of writing.  I had a couple of marathon days in there, so my average was somewhere around 650 words even though the daily minimum was only 25o words.  I’m really pleased with that.  Anyway, since I had such fun, I decided to host a Novel Push Initiative for October.  From October 1-31, the goal is to write every day. It’s all about creating good writing habits and making the push, even if it’s just a small one of 250 words.

So, without further ado, The Rules (which I have swiped shamelessly from Merrilee, who in turn had swiped them shamelessly from Nick Enlowe, creator of the NPI):

NPI is for: Anyone having trouble making progress on their WIP, anyone finding it difficult to develop a habit of writing daily, anyone who is looking for motivation and support from fellow writers.

Who it’s not for: If you’re already pumping out daily words, this is not the challenge for you! Go get yourself geared up for Nano.

THE BASICS

  • Event will run from October 1 to October 31 (just in time to go celebrate All Hallows Eve)
  • Pick just one project for this event (preferably something novella/novel-sized)  No project hopping allowed this time unless you happen to finish one and want to move on to your next project.

Word counts:

The way we did it with Merrilee works, so I’m keeping it:

  1. If this is your first time doing NPI, your daily goal is 250 words.
  2. If this is your second time doing NPI, your daily goal is 350 words
  3. If you are an NPI veteran,  you can either go with 350 words, or nominate your own daily count.
  • You’ll need to publish your daily word counts every day by midnight either by commenting here on my blog or on Twitter.  Please use #NovelPI (npi is taken)  and @kaitnolan to make sure I can find your tweet.

The simplest Tweet can look like this:

@kaitnolan 350 words. #novelpi
11:59 PM Sept 29th from web.

  • Of course, you’ll want to double-check your local settings to make sure it matches your time zone.

And just in case, it might be a good idea to say what day you’re reporting in case you’re on the opposite side of the globe from me, so I don’t get confused.

As this is a slightly longer marathon, but still only 4 weeks, there will be no project hopping.  You will write and post your daily count until either you miss a day, or you write ‘the end’.

Those of you writing over 350 words can have one (1) day of reprieve, where you can skip writing.

I will post 7 day updates on everyone’s progress.  The progress meter is as follows (also stolen from Nick):

  1. A “Knock-out” is 0-249 words.
  2. An “Update” is 250-999 words.
  3. A  “Session” is 1,000-1,667 words.
  4. A “Tougher-than-NaNo” is anything greater than 1,667.
  5. An “End of the Book” is when you’ve completed your WIP and typed ‘THE END’.

WHAT’S IN IT FOR ME? (do I still need to mention that I stole this?):

  • At the very minimum, if you keep up, you’ll end up with 7,750-10,850 words added to your work-in-progress. This is a great kick-in-the-butt for procrastinators!
  • I think you’ll find NPI is surprisingly uplifting and friendly—everybody participating (and the people watching from the sidelines) tend to be extremely supportive. Which leads me to…
  • You’ll meet lots of new friends! 😀

So, who’s in?  Leave your name, the title of your WIP,  and a link to your blog and/or twitter account in the comments.   You have until Thursday morning to sign up.

20 thoughts on “Sign Up For The Next Novel Push Initiative!

  1. Mememe!

    As a vet, I’m in for 350 a day. Going to pants this one and see where it takes me.

    The title is “Pish-Posh!”, horror, a longish short/short novella.

    You know where I live 😉

  2. ME TOO! Hooray! I would have missed you guys. Love the brain-shaking effect of writing alongside Antipodeans who are always a day ahead of me — I will NEVER catch up!

    Still working on Jumping for Joy; I commit to 350 words a day — which even if that’s all I do, should see me finishing this project. So excited at the prospect! Also have next project waiting in the wings, already outlined.

    Thanks for doing this Kait.

  3. I’m in! I got a lot of work done during the last one, so I’m looking forward to the push again. I’m really hoping to be done before the end of the month though, so even though this is only my second time (and I’ll keep the 350 minimum for sanity sake), I’m setting a personal goal of writing “the end” by October 24. That’ll mean several big days for me, but I’m going for it anyway 😀

  4. I’d really like to do this. I’m planning on Nano, but I don’t really want to wait a whole other month — or start with such a huge challenge. I’m a newbie, so 250 words for me. My WIP is titled “The Perfect Ten.”

    No blog or twitter, so I’ll post with you, Kait. Thanks!

  5. Against my better judgement . . . I’m in. Newbie, so 250 for me. WIP is just called Angel at the moment. Need to get back into writing just a little every day, since I have let homework kick it entirely off my radar for over a month now!

  6. Oops, better late than never! Stuck my hand up on Twitter (@J_Dalgliesh) but not yet commented here.

    My WIP is Starstruck (working title). It’s a SF novel about a family theatre troupe, set in the far future. Touring live productions to far-flung human colonies in their purpose-built ship is the perfect cover for diplomacy and the occasional bit of espionage. And this family has some very special qualities…

    Think Kit Marlowe meets Firefly with a bit of genetic modification thrown in for fun.

    I’m still in planning but have realised I’m a pantser by nature – best ideas come as I write words on the page. So I’m pantsing with a compass but no map. 🙂

  7. Ok, I’m in. First time doing anything like this, so just 250 words for me. The working title for my novel is Holiday. It’s chick lit through and through.
    Thanks for the encouragement Kait.

  8. I’m in. I need something to push me forward and this sounds like the thing. 🙂 And 250 words a day – that’s like a page. I can do a page a day, even on weekends.

    If it’s not too late, my wip is The Long Way Home and is a paranormal/supernatural something. I don’t think it’s a romance and I’m not sure it’s dark enough for urban fantasy so we’ll just call it a paranormal/supernatural women’s fiction novel. 🙂

  9. What a great warm-up for NaNoWriMo! My project piece has the working title *Face Lift*–it’s about people who collect the skins of others and the others who make use of those skins.

    This is my first time participating in NPI, so it’s 250 words a day for me. I’m at http://twitter.com/Shawn_Writes

    Happy writing, all.

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