(https://rmrk.net/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.thepublishingspot.com%2Fuploads%2Fnanowrimo_logo_2c.jpg&hash=6d4c89941c43d5c99fdaeeeacde5956cbe531d53)
Some of you may have heard of the National Novel Writing Month (http://www.nanowrimo.org/) (also known as NaNoWriMo), most of you probably have not. The National Novel Writing Month is a creative writing project held annually in November in which participants attempt to write a 50,000 word novel in one month. Valuing enthusiasm and perseverance over painstaking craft, NaNoWriMo is a novel-writing program for everyone who has thought fleetingly about writing a novel but has been scared away by the time and effort involved. Because of the limited writing window, the ONLY thing that matters in NaNoWriMo is output. It's all about quantity, not quality. The kamikaze approach forces people to lower their expectations, take risks, and write on the fly. It's a daunting task to write a 50,000 word story, but last year alone they had 21,720 people who managed to finish. And this year, I'd like some people from RMRK to join those ranks if they can. We're mostly a creative game making community, and it's time we show off that creative energy.
THE RULES:
- You may start your story at midnight on November 1st and must try to submit a 50,000 word story by 11:59:59 PM on November 30th. You can make plans in advance but you can't start actually writing before November 1st.
- You can write any genre, theme, language, or format that you wish. Everything from fanfiction, which uses trademarked characters, to novels in poem format, and even metafiction is allowed, AS LONG AS IT IS A NOVEL. They define a novel as a lengthy work of fiction, and as their FAQ states: "If you consider the book you're writing a novel, we consider it a novel too!"
- You have to be the sole author of your work. No buddying up with someone as far as writing if you want to officially enter. Bouncing ideas off of someone or even having someone dictate to you what to write is fine, as long as it's your work.
- It obviously has to be more than one word repeated 50,000 times, but other than that quality doesn't matter; the main goal is just quantity.
- You'll have to register to have it checked for word count before midnight on November 30th and be officially declared a winner, but that takes all of forty seconds to do and there's no obligations at all even if you do sign up. You can do it anytime from now until the end of the contest I believe.
Go ahead and check out their website for more exact details on rules and such. Honestly, they won't check for cheating other than making sure it's in on time and not just a joke of words repeated over and over again. They aren't going to read what you write, as that's just plain impossible for them to try to read all of them.
THE PRIZES:
Now, why would any sane person do this, you might ask? What's in it for them? Well, there are officially no prizes for completing it other than a little certificate that you can show off if you like, and the satisfation of having fininshed. HOWEVER! Here on RMRK, we're going to hold our own mini-contest as part of the overall larger contest. And as part of the RMRK contest version, we're going to not only offer some prizes for those who manage to complete this enormous task (if anyone actually is able to), but a good prize to whoever writes the best novel as will be judged later after the official contest is over.
Currently the prizes are up for debate on what I personally have to offer and what others may be willing to contribute to get the creative juices flowing. However, I'm negotiating with some skilled artists for the possibility of getting some illustrations or cover pages done for your novel so that you can even submit your work to a real publishing company for the chance of really getting your work out there. If you have some suggestions for prizes or would even like to contribute something, feel free to PM me or just post right here in this thread.
If you're interested in this, go ahead and give it a shot, whether you do it as part of the official contest or just as part of this mini-contest here on RMRK. Post here if wanna join in, there's no shame in not being able to complete it in time. This thread will serve as discussion about the contest and prizes, as feedback for you if you wanna bounce ideas off of us, as a place for you to shamelessly plug your work to try to intimidate others, and as a place for general partying once the contest starts and ends.
So good luck to you all if you give it a try, and I hope to see some great work put out there. :3