NaNoWriMo News

Speaking of NaNoWriMo (which I was in the last post), this will be my third (or is it fourth?) year as a participant, and from the July update, it looks like this year will be better than ever. First, Chris Baty, the founder of the "event" or "contest" or "insane spectacle" — whatever you want to call it — has published a book:

No Plot? No Problem: A low-stress, high-velocity guide to writing a novel in 30 days will be out in September. It's 175 pages of fun strategy, tender support, and merciless pants-kicking, all designed to help you thrive in November's frenzied creative milieu. Once read, it will also give you the ability to speak Italian and see through steel, though the publishers don't want me to talk about that.

Sure, it's a shameless ploy to make some money off of all those aspiring novel-writers out there, but I've been getting writing encouragement and advice from Baty for several years and I can tell you this book will probably be worth your pennies.

In addition to the book, NaNoWriMo is partnering with a non-profit group to help build a library somewhere in the world where people don't have access to such a thing:

That group is called Room to Read, and they've built over 1000 libraries in areas like Cambodia, Nepal and India. We'll be donating 20% of NaNoWriMo's net proceeds to them this year. Our goal for 2004 is to raise enough money to build a NaNoWriMo-sponsored library in a community that could otherwise not afford one. This may seem like a ridiculous goal, but if there's something that NaNoWriMo excels at, it's ridiculous undertakings.

I don't think NaNoWriMo has ever had much in the way of "proceeds," but now there's a better than ever reason to make sure that changes. I can't wait for November. (But, well, yeah I can. I've got lots to do between now and then!!)

Posted 07:08 AM | life generally

Two Days

My summer internship ends tomorrow, Friday the 13th. Is the date somehow significant?

Strangely, I don't really want this job to end. It would be great if I could continue doing it through school for 10-20 hours/week or something, but I just can't see how that's going to be possible. This fall will be full with EJF, NLG, and ACS obligations and activities, not to mention some journal work, plus class, plus novel-writing through november. Oh, and then there's are all that career research I should probably be doing and all those resumes I should probably send out. Isn't now the time I'm supposed to be getting clerkship applications ready if that's something I want to do?

It's going to be one crazy fall, no doubt about it.

Posted 06:59 AM | Comments (1) | 1L summer 2L