Don’t let Week 2 pull you down. Yes, the excitement of creating a new tale is past, and your characters aren’t behaving in quite the same way you’d envisioned before you started this novel. But just because it’s gotten hard, doesn’t mean that your novel isn’t going well. You might not be meeting the goals you set at the beginning of the month, but you are creating a novel out of your imagination, and that is amazing.
You understand how your characters must to struggle through conflict to make a compelling story, and that same concept in many ways applies also to you, the author. If this were easy, everyone would be a novelist. But it’s not easy, it can be terrifying, and boring, and lonely, and … and …
But you are doing it. So keep doing it, one word, one paragraph, one scene at a time. And if you need motivation to keep going, join us at a writing event or in our Slack chatroom for inspiration.
Here’s where we’ll be during Week 2, with all the details to be found in the Spokane Region’s Calendar.
- 11/8 Thomas Hammer 1:00 pm (that’s happening right now!)
- CWI Kettle Falls Library 5:00 pm
- 11/9 Fortified Friday (Taste of India) 6:30 pm
- 11/10 Rocket Bakery 2:00 pm
- 11/11 Grand Office Park 12:00 pm
- 11/12 Virtual on Slack 6:00 pm
- 11/13 Valley Library 5:00 pm
- 11/14 Denny’s N-side 6:00 pm
- CWI South Hill Library 1:00 pm
The Buddy System:
For a bit of additional motivation, this year we’re breaking up all Spokane Home Region Authors with any word count over zero into small buddy teams of 7-10 people. At the moment we have over 200 out of 301 home region authors with word count. You’ll all be assigned into a team (A thorugh Z) on a random basis, and then it’s up to the indiviudal team members to determine how to interact with and support your new writing buddies.
We’re hoping that the team asisgnments will provide you with an introduction to a smaller set of like-minded folk you can turn to for support, ideas, or to just check in and see how things are going, but there is no compusion for you to connect at all. However, there may be some inherent competition built into the system, with the team results being shown on our Word War Tool, which will also be linked to the regional thread announcing the buddy assignments (patience, it’s still being sorted out).
The team assignments should be posted by early Friday morning on the Spokane Forum. Check it out when you update your word count tomorrow. (If I get enough words written toward my novel, you may even see the post up after dinner tonight).
Now go, stomp the Week 2 Blahs into the dirt, and tell them I said to leave you and your amazing novel alone.
Spokane River Writers 