Writing Challenge Wins

Writing Wins

A brief accounting of writing challenges I’ve participated in and completed. Organized by oldest to newest.

July 2018

Camp Nano

30,000 Words Drafted

My very first writing challenge was in July 2018 and I achieved my goal of 30k words. I think the most I’d written prior was something like 10k words in a month so I was thrilled when I was able to draft 1/3 of my first book in such a short timeframe. I ended the month far more confident in my drafting abilities than I’d been prior.

November 2018

NaNoWriMo

50,000 Words Drafted

This was my first full NaNoWriMo challenge and I chose to work on Book 2 since the last part of Book 1 was giving me writer’s block and wanted to keep moving forward. The 50k word goal was definitely a challenge but I squeaked out a win in the last few minutes on November 30 and was able to draft about 1/2 of Book 2.

April 2019

Camp Nano

30,000 Words Edited

I started the editing process (developmental edits) for Book 1 just before April and kept the momentum going into Camp Nano. I got through roughly 1/3 of Draft 2 by the end of the challenge. (Draft 1 was 90k+ words.) I blogged about my initial experience with editing prior to Camp Nano here.

November 2019

NaNoWriMo

50,220 Words Drafted

For the November 2019 challenge, I scrapped plans to finish Draft 2 and rewrote the first half of Book 1. I had discovered plot holes that needed immediate correction and wasn’t comfortable finishing the draft until I worked out the issues. I renamed my previous editing as Draft 1.5 and started over with a new Draft 2.

April 2020

Camp Nano

10,022 Words Drafted

I didn’t write as many words as I’d hoped this month but I did manage to add a few more chapters to Book 2. We were right at the beginning of distance learning and there was a significant adjustment period while we got used to new schedules and workloads. I blogged about it here.

July 2020

Camp Nano

200 Pages Edited

I shifted back to working on Book 1 for July’s Camp Nano and edited at least 200 pages. 2020 was pretty chaotic and I forgot to journal about my Camp experience this month. I can’t remember the specifics about this challenge.

November 2020

NaNoWriMo

51,168 Words Drafted

This NaNoWriMo, I cleansed my mental palate by drafting the majority of a romantic thriller. I ran into a number of problems while working on this book, the greatest being computer problems that made it impossible to type. I finished the month by audio recording my draft and had to estimate the final word count.

April 2021

Camp Nano

40,387 Words Edited

I went back to editing Book 1 and set a more ambitious Camp goal of 40k to try to finish Draft 2. I didn’t quite get there because I deleted an entire plot line and had to add a bunch of new content to move the story in a better direction. I believe that editing and drafting was about 50/50 this month.

July 2021

Camp Nano

32,000 Words Edited

I continued editing Book 1 this July but chronic pain and brain fog issues made it difficult to remember to share or journal about it. I did achieve my goal but I don’t remember much about the journey. I think this is when I finally finished all the developmental edits for Draft 2.

April 2022

Camp Nano

37,950 Words Edited

I started Draft 3 (world-building edits) for Book 1 during NaNoWriMo 2021 but was not able to finish due to health issues. My goal for April’s Camp Nano was to edit 30k words and, if possible, push through to the end of the draft so I could move on to getting feedback from beta readers. I met my goal a few days early, kept going, and finished the month with only 1 chapter left to edit.

July 2022

Camp Nano

Undetermined Goal

I don’t remember recording any details about this particular Camp Nano challenge. My NaNoWriMo page says 3,600 words but I’ve never set a goal that low. This might have been a glitch when the organization revamped their website and some stats didn’t transfer over to the new format correctly. I do know that I had found a few issues when doing a readthrough of Draft 3, so I went back for another round of edits to make sure it was solid for beta readers.

July 2023

Camp Nano

65,400 Words Edited

I went into July’s Camp Nano with the intent of finishing Draft 3.5, but I couldn’t pull together my thoughts enough to figure out the underlying problem that kept it from reading the way I wanted. I line-edited for most of the month, only revising small plot issues until I ended up in the hospital at the end of the month and had to quit writing. I had the wind knocked out of me for a few months and couldn’t write at all until I’d recovered.

November 2023

NaNoWriMo

50,007 Words Edited

In November 2023, I was feeling better but was still dealing with writer’s block on Book 1 so I decided to spend my energy on Book 2. (I wanted to keep moving forward in whatever way I could.) I rewrote some of my previous work to update storylines I’d changed in Book 1 and then drafted a bunch of new chapters. I’d estimate that I finished almost 3/4 of the draft. Once I actually switch to it full time, it should take me a lot less time to finish.

July 2024

Camp Nano

33,800 Words Edited

For July’s Camp Nano, I worked on fixing Draft 3.5 of Book 1. I made solid strides with it, though there was still a missing element that I couldn’t figure out. I later blogged about it here. It’s essentially the same problem that kept me stuck in writer’s block for the last 2 years. Given the health issues weighing me down, I was still very pleased with what I was able to work out and I kept searching for answers after Camp was over.

November 2024

Rough Draft Challenge

30,850 Words Edited

This November, instead of participating in NaNoWriMo (due to some controversy) I chose to do Sarra Cannon’s very first Rough Draft Challenge. I opted for the Diamond level challenge (choose your own) and set a goal of editing 60k words to finish up the last of Book 1’s revisions. Unfortunately, our household came down with a bug at alternating times and I had little time to work on my book for nearly 3 full weeks. I adjusted my goal to 30k once we all felt better and crossed the finish line on the 29th.