I’m so excited.  Not only did I get to meet Stephen Fry AND Mark Carwardine this weekend at the Cheltenham Literary festival, who both signed my book, and join Neil Gaiman (05)John and Carol Barrowman(08), and Toni Morrison(08) on my pride of place ’signed’ corner, but we’re nearly at Nanowrimo 09!

For those of you that don’t know what it is (where have you BEEN, it’s been running now for 11 years!) basically you go mad for 30 glorious and (legal) stimulant of your choice fuelled days (mine is Coca-Cola and fresh air, alongside copious hugs from the kids and my other half, and write 50k. I take it a step further and aim to do three books during that time – two main, one alt (and I’ll announce what they are this year on Wednesday). Not only do I write three books a year (or at least try – and make it most years to around 120k), but I’m also an ML and a full time student.

I’m actually ready (writing wise at least) this year. I have two different writing software projects – Liquid story binder and WriteWay Pro. I’ve *got* both because they suit the different styles of writing I use, and makes it easier for me to spend time actually writing instead of bending the program to my will.

I also, as a first, grabbed the spreadsheets that have been published for the Nanowrimo – I’ve seen lots of nice ones, but this one (by salzke (nanowrimo username) ) is really cool. Easy to customise to what I need (because it’s a pain in the ass to unlock a sheet and find all the different places that it’s using 50k in it’s calculations instead of, say 150k), and pretty too .

I’m already having to make concessions to my other plans – one Nano is part of my dissertation, and I’ll probably be submitting a fragment of the other one for my assignment in December, because there’s no other way to handle it, without going noisily mad.
So, who else is ready?

Kai

Kai is a writer, author and avid reader.  A mental health advocate, Ludosport athlete and coder. She’s the mother of two young adults, owned by two cats, and lives with her beloved in the Cotswolds.