Coming up next - NaNoWriMo!!

30 DAYS...50,000 WORDS.  Can you do it?

Yep, boys and girls, it's getting to be that time of year. November is right around the corner, which means National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo will be here before you can dangle a participle.

For those of you unfamiliar with this happily-controlled chaos, NaNoWriMo is a worldwide race to write an original 50,000 word novel in 30 days. When I first participated in 2008, during which I wrote the soon to be published Red Awakening, Book 2 of The Erebus Files, I had intended to make it a yearly event. However, Life, and all its many quirks, turns, and detours, interfered with that. Four moves (one state-to-state), three jobs, nursing my mother through terminal cancer, and my father through losing my mother, took center stage to any creative endeavors or goals.

Life has settled down somewhat since then, and even though, as of yesterday, the contract that has for the past six months been paying my bills expired, leaving with me with a sudden wealth of time and a dearth of money, I am bound and determined to participate in this year's contest. Despite being in the middle of writing Hazard, Book 3 of The Erebus Files, I will happily put it aside to work on my chosen NaNoWriMo novel, the as-yet untitled second book of The 'Ru Lexicon. I'm frantically pulling together an outline and gathering my characters in preparation.

For any of you budding or seasoned writers new to this phenomenon, you'll never find a better excuse to write that novel than NaNoWriMo. Plus you get to do it with the support and encouragement of a HUGE community of both professional and hobby writers. So what are you waiting for? Join in the over-caffeinated, sleep-deprived, punch-drunk fun that is NaNoWriMo!!!