National Novel Writing Month 2018: 8 Tips For NaNoWriMo Writers From Published Authors

National Novel Writing Month is less than a day away, but that doesn’t mean you should start panicking. If you’ve decided to give NaNoWriMo 2018 a try and plan to write a 50,000-word book in November, there are plenty of tips and tricks you can use to help you reach that goal.

To get you started on a successful NaNoWriMo journey, International Business Times asked seven published authors to share their best writing tips. Here’s the advice they had to offer:

1. Spend Some Time With Your Characters Before Writing.

“I think, kind of building on your characters is a really good way to start,” Beth Reekles, Wattpad star and author of “The Kissing Booth,” said at WattCon. “Just getting their voices and understanding who you’re writing about [is important]. Because a lot of the times, the characters really kind of bring the story to life so much, and that’s what people really relate to.”

2. Just Write, Even If You Have To Do It Out Of Order

“Here’s my best piece of advice: write the pages,” Justin Cronin, author of “The Passage,” advised at New York Comic Con. “You do not write a novel by sitting down and starting, you write a novel by sitting down and finishing.”

He continued: “The most important thing is you don’t sit there rewriting page 50 for four months. If you can’t figure out page 50 but you know what happens on 52, go write page 52…Don’t just sit there, write something. Until you have something, you have nothing.”

3. Have A Specific Ending In Mind That You Can Work Towards.

“To prevent myself from quitting, I usually think of the ending first,” Victoria/V.E. Schwab, author of “Vengeful,” shared at New York Comic Con. “That way, I have something that I’m working towards, something concrete. On good days, I’m really excited to reach that point. On bad days, it keeps me from quitting…Even if it’s not gonna be your final ending, [and] it’s just gonna be a placeholder ending, I like to have that. That [gives] me some momentum along the way.”

4. Hold Off On The Revisions.

“Really just write it,” Monica Sanz, Wattpad star and author of “Seventh Born,” said at WattCon. “Because if you start thinking about, ‘Oh, I need to fix this, I need to fix that,’ you’ll just get caught in the cycle of revision when the book isn’t even finished. So, just finish the book, and then you can go back and fix it because you can actually fix what’s there, as opposed to trying to edit a blank page. Just write.”

5. Reward Yourself For Hitting Writing Goals.

“Try to do a rewards system,” Lindsey Summers, Wattpader and author of “Textrovert,” said at WattCon. “So, every week, if I reach my goals, I can have my favorite cupcake from my favorite bakery, and if I don’t, I have to run five miles. So, cupcake [or] running. It really works really well.”

6. Readers Might Not Like Cliffhangers, But Writers Should.

“It’s more of a tactic, [but] when you are writing, especially against a word count kind of goal, like NaNoWriMo, try to always end on a cliffhanger for yourself,” Zoe Aarsen, Wattpad writer and author of “Light as a Feather,” told IBT. “So that the next day, when you sit down, you’re already excited about what you have to put down.”

7. Break Up Your Writing Into Easier, Smaller Chunks.

“The only way I can get words on the page is to think about the project in bite-sized pieces,” Sarah MacLean, author of “Wicked and the Wallflower” shared with IBT via email. “[One hundred thousand] words is way too many to write, but that’s 100 words, 1,000 times. And you can write 100 words, no problem, right? I keep track on a notepad, and try to remember that every novel is just 100 words over and over and over.”

8. Find Ways To Keep Yourself Accountable.

“If you’re on Wattpad, I would highly recommend posting what you’ve written every single day on Wattpad because it keeps you accountable, and your readers keep you accountable,” Summers said.

NaNoWriMo starts on Nov. 1, and writers who would like to officially participate in the event can sign up on the site here.