With Preptober well underway and National Novel Writing Month in the near distance, I thought it would be fun to discuss where my head is at with the both of them. Like I said in a previous blog post, I have returned to my love of reading. What I didn’t say is I am also over 15,000 words into what I hope to be my debut novel (more to come on the prior novel I shelved). I won’t go into too much detail, but I’m writing a Young Adult Contemporary story.

During Preptober, I have been diligently working (when I am not slammed with my day job, church and home responsibilities) to get words on the page. One of my goals is to have 20,000 words written by the end of Preptober, leading into NanoWriMo. My second goal is to write 30,000 words during NanoWriMo. The second goal is pretty big because while I did end the last NanoWriMo I participated in with about 30,000 words, I wrote many of those words before NanoWriMo began. But nothing beats a failure but a try, right? My long-term goal is to have a complete novel with 65,000 words, so having 50,000 words by the end of NanoWriMo would be amazing.

Still, I am not going to push myself harder than need be. If I can’t reach the goal, that is okay. Grace is key. I want to give myself the time I need to get the words down, and I hope you do the same with any writing projects you may have. Also, feel free to leave your plans for Preptober and NanoWriMo below. I would love to connect. Us writers need to stick together.

-Jas