And we're off!

National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo as it is more commonly called, is underway again, I'm taking the plunge this time around after a hiatus of three years. Astute readers will no doubt recall that I participated in the 2006 NaNoWriMo, completing a 60,000-word first draft of The Librarian's Tale that November with a day or two to spare.

My jump to professional librarian in October 2007 made repeating the feat the following year a nigh-impossibility, and although last year was much better for my writing overall I was too deep into special project limbo at work to commit. This year is a whole different ball of wax, however, so despite the fact that I'm already about 70,000 words into a fantasy anthology (Varonian Nights), I'm throwing down the virtual gauntlet with myself.

So far, so good- it's Day Two and I'm already at 6,000 words! I think I did myself a huge favor by not attempting to shift genres on myself, keeping the novel set in the same fantasy universe as Confessions of Gourmand, The Librarian's Tale, and Varonian Nights. This one is a hard-boiled detective story- crossbow noir, if you will- and it's way too much fun to channel a little bit of Raymond Chandler for a month.

While I have an official profile at NaNoWriMo.org, this time around I'll be doing most of my progress updates on Twitter. To all those people out there who are also making their way towards 50k this month: good luck! Remember that your only goal this month is to write, not to edit, re-write, or second guess yourself and/or your writerly output. Send your internal editor on vacation until December 1st and focus on the simple joy of putting words together for a spell.

Stay tuned! And wish me luck...