I've competed twice, once in 2004, once in 2014. The first time I competed, and 'won,' the heavens opened, the angels sang, and I thought 'I can do this, I can write a novel from start to finish.' It was a crucial turning point in my growth as a writer.
Once I crossed that line, I decided that NaNo had accomplished its primary purpose, establishing the toggle state of my identity as a writer as 'yes.' For the next nine years I focused on learning how to write scenes and short stories, and I never felt the compulsion to try it again. I'd already run the race and had proven what I needed to prove.
I competed again in 2014 to see if I could still do it with a different premise and genre. It was harder but I finished most of the first draft of THE BLUE GOLEM save the big epic finale. I told myself I could knock out the rest of the novel in a weekend, and let all my friends and family know that they'd have a draft to read Real Soon Now.
But what I didn't know then was that I needed to grow as a writer to cross the next big crossroads in my writing journey, and I didn't know what I didn't know. 2014 turned to 2015 without finishing the story, and things just sort of got away from me. I knew what I thought I needed to do, and every time I sat to try to finish it, I was met with an unbreachable wall. All that confidence about being a writer went right out the window.I began to think that first finished draft was a fluke and I'd never be 'that good' again. It was utterly demoralizing.
In 2015 Shawn Coyne's book THE STORY GRID was all the rage and I bought it thinking it would help me. However, once it arrived, I cracked it open, shrieked at the apparent complexity, threw it in a desk drawer, and my hopes were dashed and my misery came flooding back.
In 2018, I clicked something from Tim Grahl to take a course about how to launch a bestseller, thinking that's what I needed, but I didn't open the course. I was beginning to feel like I was falling victim to the sunk cost fallacy, throwing good money after bad.
A week later, however, I got the big break I'd been waiting for. Tim sent another email for the first Story Grid online course, Level Up Your Craft. It occurred to me that I should probably try to finish a manuscript before trying to sell it, and I thought 'in for a penny,' and signed up.
And promptly panicked as I realized that the course likely assumed that I'd already read THE STORY GRID. I dug the book out, skipped the entire first section about how he'd come to write the book, and dove into the theory.
And immediately saw what my problem had been since 2014–it came down to genre. I was writing a Fantasy / Noir on a Thriller foundation but was trying to shoehorn in an Epic Action ending. The solution was so simple and so obvious. I wondered if this epiphany was too good to be true. I realized I'd already written a perfectly serviceable Thriller ending, so I cut the Epic Action ending and everything fell into place with an almost audible 'thunk.' (I'd later have to go back and change my Worldview first chapter to conform to the Thriller elements of the rest of my novel, so I killed a guy and the first chapter started working, as well.)
Since then, I've delved deeply into the study of story structure and come to appreciate the virtue of a good outline. After being a proud Discovery writer for over 40 years, I've settled into a more balanced Plantser place. I've since finished that first draft, found an editor, and rewritten the entire novel with an eye toward making sure my scenes contained all the Five Commandments of story. I have a rough outline in Notion that I now use when writing new scenes and chapters, and I'll finally be ready to publish that 2014 NaNo novel early next year.
tl-dr: NaNo was instrumental for me as the roughest possible metric, 'can I write a rough draft of 50k+ words in 30 days with a beginning, middle, and end?' I now have a routine where I write six days a week and turn a new chapter in every week to my editing group. I'm still honing my story structure chops in continuing study. NaNo was a vital part of my journey, but once I finished, its utility for me was complete. I'm glad I did it but no longer need that particular activity and find my time is now better spent being more deliberate about what I'm writing.
