Yes, I need this. Do you? Maybe, maybe not. But for me, keeping track of my NaNoWriMo stats publicly helps me a lot in more ways than one. I’m going to be updating my progress both on Mythic Scribes and here on my blog. I may be offering a bit more detailed insight here on my blog, just to give a little extra. So I’ll have four of this posts, one for each week that I’ll update daily.

Here’s my first post:

Day 1: It’s already 2:40 am here in Japan, officially Nov. 1st, so I started working on my WIP. I’m going the “rebel” route this year as I didn’t want to start on anything new. So before I go to bed, I hit 1,623 words, just shy of the goal for the day. I suspect I’ll hammer out quite a few more when I wake up later today.

I’m not completely enamored with what I wrote so far, but I think it’s the direction this particular novel needed to go. I’m leaving off a lot of humor, which I actually prefer in my stories, but I’ve found for this one, splashing it here and there is going to work. My next chapter is going to make up for the last serious chapter, I hope.

Added Analysis: Last night I before going to be I started thinking, “Phil, you can just write a whole new novel. Leave this one and start over. Seriously.” I really struggled with this and in the end I said, “No.” Even though I’m technically a NaNo Rebel, I rather go this route this time and finish something I’m working on. However, my biggest fear is rushing my work due to wanting to reach the 50K word goal. 

I still have a good deal of Day 1 left, so let’s see what I come up with.

Day 2: Despite battling sickness, I’m forging on ahead. It may actually be helping me in some ways. I’m up to 5,635 words, while par is 3,333. So I’m ahead of the game so far. This is usually how things start. I do really well the first week and then slow down. We’ll see how things go.

I’m enjoying some new characters I introduced and I feel like their motivations are shining through more than they were in my original version (this is my 2nd attempt at this story after getting some feedback that I felt made a lot of sense). While the story has more horror elements than it did the first go around, I felt it was suffering in the comedy department, which was something I really wanted to play up. However, since introducing some characters, the humor is seeping back in thankfully. I’m excited to see where things go.

I’ve got a big, insane fight scene coming up, so that should be fun to write. Looking forward to it!

 Day 3: I’ve got 9,430 words so far. I’ve been picking and editing stuff from other drafts, but I haven’t been including that in my word count, only brand new stuff I’ve written since November started. My whole novel (counting what I’ve done so far before November) is at 22,841. Pretty solid for having basically just started the whole thing over at the beginning of October. If I stay at this pace, I may have a completed first draft by the end of the year. That was my goal in any case. If I get the 50K for November and I get a good word count in December, I’ll be raring to go!

I’m liking my character more this go around, too. She has a clearer purpose and goal and is not as whiny as she was before. I also added some villainous folks that make my skin crawl, so I’m glad I added them as well. They’re so slimy they don’t mind hanging out in sewer tunnels.

The day’s not over yet here, so I still have more to go I hope. I’m gearing for at least 10K by the end of the day. Here’s hoping!

I wrote the big, insane and it was as big and insane as I expected. Although I may have to clean it up some come edit time.

I don’t know what others are doing, but I’m finding writing in short bursts is helping me a lot. I’ve been off work for three days though, so that’s allowed me a lot of free time that others probably don’t have at the moment. I’m thankful for the free time anyway!

 Day 4: I’m up to 11,353 words now. Still ahead of the game, so to speak, but I had a weaker day than I anticipated at 1,923 words. Still, that’s pretty decent so far. I’m hoping to hammer out some more words before midnight (I have about 45 minutes) so I’ll save those words for tomorrow.

MC is in a cabin by herself looking for clues as to the nature of her kind of weird hunter host. Sometimes “by myself” scenes can be kind of boring, but she’s bashing down doors and stuff, so that’s fun!

 Day 5: Very weird day. I actually got about 2,000 something words from about 12 am to 2:30 am to end up at 13,434 words. I stayed at that number all day even though I had plenty of time to work. So I’m pulling another “late night write” by trying to crank out some big numbers for Day 6. I’m hoping to get another 1,000 words before going to bed and hammer out some more during the day.

Day 6:  Got up to 15,357 words now. I always love crossing the 15K threshold. I’ve been tempted to go back and fiddle with some things, but I decided forging forward is best. I have an extra file called “Notes for editing” attached to each chapter on Scrivener so I can make notes at any point about problems I’m having or things I need to change. I’m actually a lot happier with this version that I’m doing now as I scrapped a lot of rather typical fantasy monsters (chimera, dragons, etc.) and put in weirder, non-traditional stuff. I have sort of smart-aleck feathered serpent (based on the achiyalabopa of Native American mythology) who I really enjoy. He wasn’t part of the original plan, but I’m liking him a lot so far.

Good luck to everyone else!

Day 7:  Just wrapped up Day 7 and I had my least productive day yet so far. Still made the goal, but I felt like the chapter I was working on was being pantsed a little too much for my comfort level, so I’m glad to get back on track with my outline with this next chapter. I ended up with a final count of 17,030 words. Now that I’m on my outline, I feel like I’m going to start hitting my stride more again. Looking forward to it!

My main character has horrible luck, by the way!

Well, that wraps up one week of NaNoWriMo. Let’s see what Week 2 brings!