From the old Writer's thread:

Aslanisthebest- I don't know about entering NaNo, but I really like books that are written in free verse! Take Song of the Sparrow by Lisa Ann Sandell. (Very good book, by the way!) I have tried to write like that, and I had to start over because I kept getting off topic. But it's a very descriptive style of writing.

I don't think I've read a book that was fully in free verse. :"} Actually, now that I think about it, I'm sure I'd go way, way off topic if I did. Maybe I'll write a 'book' with a bunch of poems, consisting of 50k words.
(People who have entered NaNo: Would it be acceptable and within rules if I did that ^? )

And about the name finding topic, I sometimes just take a name of something on Earth, say, twilight. (not the book. How many people did I have to tell that to when I say that word at school?!?) Then I twist it a little and come up with a name, like Twillie or something.

Haha! That's a really nice way to find names. Mine is far less creative...I just go with looking at baby-name websites.

Thanks for the information on Nano, Fencer! I think I might join this year, if I'll be allowed to write a small book with many poems in it. (Because, as you said, writing one whole book in free verse would be quite a challenge)

And, I hope all goes well with your manuscript!

I don't think I've ever quite understood poetry; I mean, I can't get the same feeling into my poetry that my favourite poets - Robert Louis Stevenson and Robert Burns - can. I just stick to rhyme, which I can do - most of the time.

Hm, I think that I get more ideas with poetry than I do with writing regularly. Oddly, however, I don't usually read poetry...

Pointless conversations! Yes, I have that problem. With the draft of my book I'm doing at the moment, I find I'm cutting out a lot of irrelevant storyline and dialogue. Then the problem is trying to figure out what to put in instead so I can cover up the gaping holes in my book.

Ditto! About ... 34% of the bits I've written are all pointless conversations, so I really need to work on that. And, also characters teasing each other. That's a cheesy habit that I tend to put in more than necessary. =S

With fantasy, I actually find these books pretty inspiring. I guess I read them and then think how I can make it different. In some cases that turned my book into a sort of parody, but over the years I've changed it so it really is something different. Keep trying!

Thanks for the encouragement! So far, the only thing that I've come up with is someone who can write something and it comes to life, or out of the manuscript. (Not like, popping out of the page, but slowly appearing in the setting. ) I think I'll do what you suggested.

Aslanisthebest: I think there's no problem with writing a long poem that tells a story for NaNo. If it has 50.000 words, you win, they don't go through your manuscript to see what you write. Do you know what would be the poem about? Off topic: I love your avatar!

Ah, okay, thanks! I'm not sure what it would be about - if it's a book with a set of poems in it, then they'll probably have different topics each.
D'aw, thanks! And likewise.

@Bella: A long poem would work and win if you hit 50,000 words, but that's a whole lot of poetry!

That's good to know! Heh, after actually considering it, I do realise it would be really hard to get that much poetry...

Nothing says the 50,000 has to be one novel or poem. They do say on the website that short story collections are allowed and many people finish their novel early and just start another one.

Oh, really? That's awesome to know! I think I might just be joining this year.
To those who have joined Nano (again...), so is there a specific website that you go to, and do you need to sign up or something like that?

hi everyone havent posted in a longgg time. But anyway nano writing thingy is back? When does that start? i might actually try this year. hehe

The National Novel Writing Month website is http://www.nanowrimo.org and it starts on November 1st. It happens every year, sillygoose!

Aslanisthebest, no problem!

I think NaNo is a good thing to do. It really encourages commitment to what you are writing! It's also fun because you can have word wars with others who are doing NaNo too ... they are great, and they really boost your word count. The other thing that's nice is the knowledge that several thousand people are also doing the same crazy thing you are.

Finally, I've been able to log on.

So for I have no new updates in regards to by book. I have only heard from two publishers and with an extended weekend, I am going to look more in detail at the publishers. Out of the two, I would go for VMI first. But my approach is going to be seeing what would be the costs, how the marketing would have to be carried out, etc. I have two big issues with having to be heavily involved with getting published. 1). I am a college student. I am broke and don't have large amounts of spending money. 2). I am a college student without a car. I can't afford to travel save for the occasional trip often funded with outside sources. (ie a fencing tournament funded by my university). I am already committed to going to St. Louis at Christmas for the 2009 Urbana Convention and all spare travel monies need to be dedicated to that. So without a car, I don't have a means of getting out to major cities for book signings and promotions. I would have to depend on friends I know in those cities to get me around. These things need to be address before a contract is signed.

I still can't make any promises about doing NaNo this year. It all depends on how my school schedule is going. With four classes (at least two having semester projects), Intervarsity, Fencing, any activity with my book, and a part-time job, I don't know yet if I can fit that into my already busy schedule. We'll just see what happens.

The National Novel Writing Month website is http://www.nanowrimo.org and it starts on November 1st.
[...]
The other thing that's nice is the knowledge that several thousand people are also doing the same crazy thing you are.

It starts on November 1st - that is, that is when you are allowed to actually start writing! You should have signed in and got your account ready and begun to post on the forum well in advance of that.

The site will close down for some time (perhaps only a few hours) in September, and then reopen for the new season on October 1st. Then you can sign up, or renew your previous account if you've already got one. So you can sign up today for the rest of this season (it is still open), and then renew your account in October!

As for what you can write - the NaNo FAQ says,

We define a novel as "a lengthy work of fiction." Beyond that, we let you decide whether what you're writing falls under the heading of "novel." In short: If you believe you're writing a novel, we believe you're writing a novel too.

But even if you believe you're not writing a novel, you can still be a part of the NaNo community and the forum. Last year there was a special Rebels forum for those who were not strictly following the rules - like myself, who was continuing an old novel rather than starting a new one. I didn't reach 50 000 words, but even if I had, I might not have registered as a winner, because I was bending the rules. But I was a part of NaNo nevertheless, and the main result of the month is the text, not the badge, anyway.

hmm...NaNo sounds interesting. Unfortunately I don't think i'm up to the challenge...yet.

I've been writing a novella of sorts and it has a few aspects that are similar to another literary work. I'm trying to figure out whether or not it is a fan fiction. What do you guys think defines a fan fiction?

If it only has a few aspects, then I'd say it was inspired by that literary work, but if the entire story revolves around the other work, I'd consider it a fanfiction.

I LOVE NaNoWriMo! This will be my 4th year, but the only year I've ever completed it was last year, and I'm determined to make it again this year. It will definitely be easier this year now that I have a laptop, and can type instead of write it all by hand! I want to try to get 75,000 - 100,000 words this year!
And I've already started making plans for this year's story...it's to be the 3rd and final book in a WWII/mystery series I've been working on for the past three years.

I love writing for children, and am actually taking a course on writing children's literature...I've just started sending out my first manuscripts to childlren's magazines, and am making plans to do a children's picture book, teaming up with my brother, who will do the illustrations.
Is anyone else interested in writing for kids?

WOW, Silvertongue. Lots of giant grins in your post!
I love writing for kids! At school, we've had to do, maybe, 5 chilren's picture books to donate to a homeless shelter. I love working with little kids, so writing is a blast!
Also, awesome story idea. WWII is a great topic to incorporate mystery with.

The book I'm writing at the moment is aimed for those around 9 to 14 years of age, so I'd count that as a children's book, or at least young teens. I'm not that interested in writing simpler books, mainly because I think I'd have to cut down a lot of my description and dialogue, and I just love them so much ... One day I should try, but at the moment I have loads of young adult and teen books kicking around in my head, so I want to write those first.

On that note, I rewrote two chapters today, so I've ony six more until this draft is complete! Maybe I will get done in time for NaNo after all.

Yay, NaNoWriMo! I'm sure we'll make a NaNo specific thread come late October, but for now we'll just have to content ourselves with this. Funny that we're still two months away from the actual event, and we're already planning! I think the second we start get just a touch of cold weather, something old and familiar stirs in our brains and we go, "Hey, cold = fall which also = NaNo!"

Last year was my first year in participating in NaNo. I wrote a novel called Golden Dreams about a gymnast who yadda yadda yadda. It was a story that had been floating around in my brain for years, and while it wasn't anything particularily brilliant I thought it would be a good story to cut my book-writing teeth on. I was, and I won NaNo just a day over the half-way mark, and ended up finishing at around 65k before NaNo actually ended. It was a really great experience and I had so much fun, and I was able to get my free proof copy from CreateSpace this last May.

In April, I teamed up with Menelve to participate in Script Frenzy, a script-writing event organized by the same group as NaNo, that happens every April. We did an adaption of King of the Wing, and managed to scrape past our 100-page minimum just in time. I'd never written a script before, so it was a new experience for me and I learned a lot. I'd love to do it again next year.

Well, now I'm in the planning stages for NaNo 2! I'm doing another sports story; this time on figure skating. It's different though in that it focues less on the sport and more on the character, which should be interesting because I haven't done too much character writing before. It's a pretty serious, deep, sad story, so we'll see how this goes...I haven't got nearly as much plot stuff worked out as I did last year, so here's hoping I'm not winging it the entire month and I actually am able to get 50k with this story, lol.

I haven't figured out a name for my book yet, and I was wondering if anyone would like to offer suggestions. It's really a story about dealing with grief and your whole world crashing in; my character losers her older sister, her mother figure, in a car accident that really sets off a lot of events that changes her life forever.

Anyway, I'm still looking for a name. It can be figure-skating related, but it doesn't have to be. I was thinking about Spirals, but that kind of gives off the impression that everything just spirals down...I mean, it does, but it DOES have closure and happiness at the end. I'm not one of those awful writers who end the book just as it gets bad.

If you have any ideas, post 'em!

Hey guys!
Well, I'm kind of new to Writer's World, so I thought I might start with a introduction of myself and then on to my book.
Ever since I was little I made up stories in my head. I would sometimes act them out with my dolls or legos for my three younger siblings. When my siblings got old enough to memorize lines, I had them act out plays that I wrote. I dabbled around with poetry and prose, but I really liked script writing. About three years ago, I decided to try my hand at short story. My family enjoyed my stories, but I never got around to writing an ending to any of my projects. In a word, I was lazy.
I realized that to write better, I needed to write a lot, so last October I began a roleplay which has become an epic story. More about that later....
When school ended in May, I began a script that had been floating around in my head, for quite some time. I wrote furiously and fast, knowing that if I stopped I might never get around to ending it. I wrote a 41 paged script in just 11 days.
This experience has given me the courage to take the next step. About a month ago, I quit my roleplay, and began working on a book series intitled Sunrise of Life series. It will have four books, Maralyn, June, Brad, and Chloe, and will include many of the plots that were in the roleplay.
This is a mountain to accomplish, as I have never even attempted one novel, much less a series of them. I would apreciate your comments as well as your prayers (I may really need them).
You will find the first three chapters, and those that follow, on my blog.
God bless, and for all of you that are doing NaNo, have fun!

Great to see you hear princess_of_narnia. Quite often that is how writer's get started. They do little things here and there, whatever comes to mind. In time, they learn that people like what you write (even if you don't yourself). Whether you want to get published or not doesn't matter. It is a great hobby to have and just to say you completed a story is still a task not many can say they've done.

Personally, I would often do short stories, growing up but I was a master at Molly Sue. I couldn't write anything in which I wasn't the hero. Not only that, I could only come up with one or two characters that were not people I knew. I what what really launched my ability to write came here on NWeb. As LWW's theatrical release, I would depict full descriptions of what the battle scene would look like. People loved it and I began to practice it more and more. Finally, as I was giving feedback to a friend of mine on his novel, he suggested I try it. So I did. And for the first time I was able to break the Molly Sue character trend and I actually had a good novel. I put that one aside and went for a spiritual warfare one that I have been posting about. After getting feedback on that (mostly from NWebbers as well), it is in proposal stage.

I sent it off to Writer's Edge Service to see if it was publishable this summer and they accepted it. Their report has reached the 85 publishers on thier list and I have just heard back from a third publisher, this one WinePress. After scanning through thier website, they look like the best route to go at this point. The only concern is that I don't see what cost would be entailed for me at this point. That is a question I will have to ask them. I am still going to sit on this one for a day or two and pray about it, but out of the three I have heard from, this one is the best way to go so far. We'll see what happens.

Well, I just joined the NaNoWriMo site and now I’m unsure what to do. As I looked through it more, it seems like my writing a collection of poetry might not be considered a novel… But, if y’all who have joined and know more about it than I do say it’s within rules, then I trust it should be.

So, you just basically write your 50,000 words in some document and then what next?

Thanks for the information, AJAiken and Varnafinde!

Silvertongue, I think writing WWII mysteries is a great idea! I really enjoy reading anything WWII related.

Gymfan, your plot for NaNo this year sounds really good! For titles, how about something like “Hope Restored”? Although, it sounds a bit cheesy.

Princess, that’s really great about you writing those novels and finally writing. I need to do that sometime and really work on something that will help me finish my stories, and work on a big project, so I’m hoping NaNo this year will help me do that, and if I join next year, that I can possible try writing a decent novel, which seems somewhat impossible at the moment.

Well, as far as preparing for NaNo goes, I’m going to keep a notebook and write topics for what the poems in the collection should be about… If you would have any ideas for that, it would be much appreciated!