Hello, readers! It's time for both my end of the month update, and to announce my plans for NaNoWriMo*.
For the month of October, I focused on looking at various submission opportunities, and to a lesser extent, posting anecdotes from my trip. I've found various places I'm going to keep an eye on for submissions - though neither of the 3 stories I have ready at them moment will work for them due to either the style not suiting them or that they don't accept simultaneous submissions (one of those pieces is currently being considered by another competition).
For November, I will be "participating" in NaNoWriMo, but not in the normal sense. NaNoWriMo 2009, I started a novel that I've referred to on this blog several times. (Working title is The Wolf and the Sheath.) 9 years later, I still haven't finished it. I have lists of things that need to be done, including scenes that still need to be written. So for NaNoWriMo this year, I am going to write at least one new scene for W and S every day. I've worked on it off and on this past year, and often find myself getting bogged down by research and trying to nail down details like place names. I'm hoping a concentrated daily effort to create new material will get me ramped back up again to make some actual real progress on it so that I can finish it before another 9 years rolls around : )
*If you're not familiar with the abbreviation, NaNoWriMo is short for National Novel-Writing Month, which takes place annually in November. Writers challenge themselves to write a 50,000 word novel in 30 days. It's not as hard as it sounds - it breaks down to about 1700 words a day, which is just a couple pages. The hard part is not writing 50,000 words - the hard part is actually finishing it.