WRITE NOW: More fun follows final week of NaNoWriMo

Hey Wrimos! Finally, November, National Novel Writing Month is over! So now it’s time to reflect on your experience: Did you finish your novel? What was your ending word count? What did you learn from NaNoWriMo that you didn’t know before? And most importantly, what’s next?

Every writer who participates in NaNoWriMo is different. Some write just to say they have done it, some write to practice their writing pace for something more important they’re working on and some write because they’ve had an idea forever and want to share it with the world. If you are the latter writer, here are a few options you have to advance your story’s progress in the world of creation.

You can show your novel to some friends, and have them write down any questions they have while reading, and edit grammar and punctuation errors. This offers you a first audience, and an opportunity to fix any plot holes in your story.

You can spend December editing it by yourself. A lot of people who participate in NaNoWriMo like to edit their work, even if they never plan on sharing it with anyone but themselves. If you had any writing buddies, maybe ask them if they also wanted to be editing buddies.

Design a cover. If you finally found a title and have a semi-finished novel in front of you, why not try your hand at some graphic design or drawing and design a cover for your novel? It would really make the month feel finished.

Otherwise, you can just let it sit there. The novel you’ve written is only as public as you want it to be, it never even has to see the light of day if you don’t want it to. While I’ve never seen someone not publicly talk about his or her novel after finishing it, you could be the first. Some people genuinely write their novels to just get words out of themselves, or to say they accomplished NaNoWriMo. It’s not the way/reason I do it, but if it’s your reason then that’s OK.

I hope you’ve had fun following along with me through NaNoWriMo 2016, and I urge you to continue writing daily, even if it’s just about your day. You never know when or where inspiration will strike.

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