I’ve mentioned before that it’s my curse to do a whole heap of research so I know exactly what I’m talking about for something that may just be an incidental prop.

It’s based on the whole ‘write what you know’ standard.

If I want to write about, for example, a pig farm, even if it’s only in one scene, I have to do some research to find out how to breed pigs, when piglets are born, how many in a litter, and then due to a character’s throwaway line I had to research why humans don’t typically consume pig’s milk.

I found out some fascinating stuff:

• Pig’s milk is higher in fat and more watery than cow’s milk, but much harder to milk.
• Cows get oxcytocin for about 4 minutes once they start being milked, which helps prolong the milking: pigs only get 15 seconds, enough to get the piglet suckling.
• Cows can also get pregnant while lactating, while pigs cannot.

I don’t mention those above facts in the story, but it sure answered my question of why don’t human consume pig’s milk, and helped my understanding of the subject. Now I can confidently write about why humans don’t consume pig milk!

NaNoWriMo is upon us, and although I said previously I was writing in silence (I still am), I have found a great song to get me motivated in the mornings, and I’m finding it applicable to NaNoWriMo wordchasers as well!

If you haven’t heard of him (and I hadn’t until a few months ago), JackSepticEye is one of the most popular Youtubers and is one of those lads who posts video game commentaries.

Some people don’t understand why anyone would rather ‘watch’ than ‘play’ games. I’ve had a few experiences that sums up why I’m a watcher:

• I’m a casual gamer. I get bored really quickly playing games. Except for The Sims, which I can play literally for hours. (that being said I am the Queen of MarioKart)
• I’m the younger sibling of a gamer. That meant when I was a kid, it was my job to sit there quietly and watch him play games, and if I ever played one with him and beat him, he’d punch me. You get used to coming second in racing games a lot. Mostly it was my job to watch the mini-map during WarCraft II campaigns.
• My husband is a gamer, and he likes to play games that are good to watch, the kind that play almost like films. We posted a run through of Until Dawn that we played ‘together’ to his YouTube channel.
• I can’t even walk straight in Gears of War.
• After watching my best friend play Batman: Arkham Asylum, and solving a few puzzles for him (I’m a nautral puzzle solver, which is why I like the Professor Layton games), I figured I could play it, it didn’t look too hard. Well, I tried, and I got too scared being Batman, and had to hand it over to my husband when he got home from work.

JackSepticEye was songified by Schmoyoho.

Be warned, this is NSFW due to language.

Someone from Book Riot whom I’m not even going to bother naming or linking to because it’s just the most riiculous thing I’ve ever read wrote a post on how ‘you don’t have to write that novel during NaNoWriMo’.

NaNoWriMo is a tool.

NaNoWriMo is an excellent time of year for those of us who have no time to write otherwise. It gives us something to explain to those parents, spouses, children, friends, co-workers, why we can’t go out because we’re attempting to write a novel in one month and this is the only time of year it happens.

Or those of us who have ‘been writing’ a novel for years but just can’t seem to finish it.

Giving yourself a set amount of words and a time limit helps.

Not everyone is going to want to do it.

Not everyone wants to write a novel.

But those who do can use the encouragement NaNo can bring.

It’s not easy.

I failed in 2012 when my computer exploded just before Back Up Your Novel day.

I didn’t even both entering in 2015 because I was taking a break from all writing to care for my mentally ill husband.

But every other year I’ve entered, I’ve ‘won’.

In 2010, I finished my first long-form (and trunked) novel in October before I tacked The Edge of Darkness in November. That long-form novel took me six years  to write. The Edge of Darkness took me one month.

I’ve started plenty of novels since then, but I’ve never actually finished anything unless it was a NaNo novel.

NaNoWriMo is something you do for fun.

No one’s forcing you.

In 2015, there were only 431,626 participants.

That’s less than half a million across the world.

Oh sure, it might seem like everyone‘s doing it, but that’s just because you’ve got your foot in the industry. Who’s most likely to be doing NaNo? Online writers, bloggers, book lovers. We encourage social media attention. We blast our climbing word counts from the skies.

And sure, you can quit if you want.

In 2015, only 40,000 made the minimum word count and verified their novels.

40,000 out of 431,626.

And not everyone is a long-form writer. In 2013 I rebelled, and used the 50,000 word count to finish a trilogy of novellas that I’d already started. (It was then I decided I probably wasn’t really suited to really long books anyway, because I burn out after a big project like Storm of Blood.)

No One Has To Read It

I like to publish my NaNo novels. I like my writing to be decent. I don’t word pad or list things or any of the other tricks savvy NaNoers slip into their manuscripts to up their word count. I’m trying to write a decent story with decent language the first time round so it’s easier to edit.

But not everyone wants their NaNo novel to see the light of day, and that’s okay.

Writing can be a chore*, especially when you don’t want to write, but that’s the beauty of NaNo: it encourages you to write every day, even when you don’t want to. And you know what? Sometimes on those days where you really can’t be bothered but you do it anyway, you can end up really enjoying it and writing absolute gems.

And this year I do feel a bit like it’s a chore because with my #supersekritproject I’ve found another way to tell stories that I’m actually enjoying almost more than I am writing my NaNo novel. I’m still loving my NaNo novel, I’m just super excited to launch the new project.

If you don’t want to write a novel in November but you feel that you should, maybe you need to examine why you feel that way.

*Some people say don’t write if it’s a chore, but I don’t listen to them.

Now, I didn’t write a post yesterday on NaNoWriMo’s inaugural day because I was too busy once I’d finished my words to write a blog post.

And I didn’t write a ‘Prepping for NaNo’ post earlier in October because I actually did my prep back in April when I did Camp NaNo. Which is a good thing because I’ve not had the time or mental fortitude to plan whole novel lately. #supersekritproject

And I didn’t write a playlist blog post because this year I’m writing in silence.

But I will tell you this: November is the time when it starts to get cold enough to turn the heat on. I have a mini heater in my office to warm my toes, and I also have a NaNoWriMo hoodie.

This is not a hoodie emblazoned with the NaNoWriMo logo. Nay, it has naught to do with NaNoWriMo except that I pretty much only wear it in November when I’m novelling.

You can keep up with my word count to the right here, with the widget in the sidebar  —>

Also, my little companion, my cat who keeps me company when I’m writing, has discovered she can kind of perch across my shoulders as I write.

Here she is trying to gauge whether or not she can make the distance in one clean jump.

Happy Novelling!