Dear Alice -

Absolutely we are all different and we want to make sure your flow goes smoothly! Whatever works for you in terms of having that go smoothly. What I find for me is just making even quick daily posts about how I'm doing helps me stay motivated. It gives me yet another reason to sit down for that hour and write.

In terms of typing 3,000 words in an hour, that is a rate of 50 words a minute. Apparently the average professional typist types from 50-80 words per minute. Advanced typists go at 120 words per minute. So absolutely we all have different typing speeds, and that is fine! The more one practices, the faster one gets, and being able to type quickly is definitely a benefit for SO many aspects of modern life. So in a way this is excellent practice for building up one's typing speed!

If you're curious, we have an online typing test -

BellaOnline Typing test

It rates my speed as 112 words per minute. So yes that's fairly quick, which absolutely helps me in all my writing tasks. I build that up over years of practice and I'm very happy that when I need to write my fingers fly as quickly as my brain does.

Another option if you don't want to take the time to build up finger speed is to get Dragon or other speech recognition software and simply speak out your writings. In my case, I type faster than I speak, so the typing is the quicker route for me.

Debra -

You are incredibly inspiring! Absolutely other editors will take heart - if you can find the time to write 10,000 words in six days, with your challenges, then everybody else can too! It shows that this is definitely possible. It's all about taking little chunks each day and focusing. This whole project is about learning to focus and to shrug off distractions. These are skills that serve us well in all parts of life!

Dear Angela -

I'll go take a look in Literary Fiction! Thanks for posting!

OK we are on Day 7 - officially one week of NaNoWriMo progress! Hurrah! Isn't it amazing how quickly that week went by?

I am now at 18,097 words total. Today I wrote 2,512. I wrote for about an hour. Things were a little slower for me today, because it wasn't as much about action or describing forests or nature or such. Instead, it was explanatory dialogue as the characters are trying to sort out what is on the dead man's hard drive. So instead of just streaming out a description of the forest path with its nuthatches and turkey tail mushrooms, I had to craft the dialogue more carefully.

And also I didn't spent as much time between yesterday and today plotting out what today would be about. So I had to stop and think about where I wanted to go with the story today. Usually I have that all decided and just write it out.

Still, progress!

How are you guys doing? How has your first week gone?

Day 8 is here!

My tally is 2,157 words for today. I was writing while eating sushi so it was sort of an eat-and-write time period. Also, this was "background filler" for my story, to catch up on some details, which I'm less fond of writing. It wasn't all the "walking on a trail in the woods" scenes that I adore. But it had to be done .

So I'm at 20,254 total, and chugging along! Tomorrow I get to go out and eat with a couple so that should be nice.

Chime in with your story!

I'm at 10,238 and starting on Day 9. Hubby didn't care for yesterday's "big idea" but I'm going to ignore him and move on, keeping his thoughts in mind to maybe change some things later.

He doesn't read my work. I just bounce ideas off him. Sometimes before writing and sometimes after.

That's great news on your progress, Alice! Congratulations!

Yes, absolutely, write what you want to write. Nobody knows the full story and background the way you do. You know how everything will fit together and how the emotions move. Trust in your instincts!

Day 9 had me going to a local restaurant to scope it out. The chapter for the day was then about me taking a suspect there and questioning him. So that was fun.

2,363 words today, for a total of 22,617 overall.

Tomorrow should be fun too! Another "location visit".

How are you guys doing?

Thanks, Lisa!

Approaching the 16,000 word mark, with the next two days off from work and the goal of getting ahead of where I should be. So far so good? Dare I say that? As long as I don't go back and re-read, I might be ok!

That's so true that what we learn from Nano serves us in all parts of life. Sometimes we just have to put our heads down and plow through... sort it out when we come out the other side!

That is wonderful news, Debra, congratulations! You sound like you're doing great!

I agree that focus and sticking-with-it are great skills to work on!