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    NaNoWriMo: A Cheater's Guide: Write Better Books, #1
    NaNoWriMo: A Cheater's Guide: Write Better Books, #1
    NaNoWriMo: A Cheater's Guide: Write Better Books, #1
    Ebook70 pages43 minutes

    NaNoWriMo: A Cheater's Guide: Write Better Books, #1

    By Laura Roberts

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    About this ebook

    Never won National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) before? Struggling to figure out what you're doing wrong?

    You need to start cheating.

    Your mother may have told you that "cheaters never win, and winners never cheat," but put that bunkum aside.

    Winners work the system.

    Winners use the tools to their own advantage.

    Winners never stop writing.

    And winners sure as hell don't believe that writing "The End" just because you hit 50K means you wrote a successful novel.

    The Cheater's Guide to NaNoWriMo will hold your hand through all of the tips, tricks, cheats and hacks you'll need to finally finish that novel, get it off your hard drive, and publish it where real people can actually read it.

    You may not become the next Stephen King, but you WILL finish your novel and win NaNoWriMo this year.

    Ready to learn how? Join the Cheaters and beat the system.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherButtontapper Press
    Release dateSep 13, 2015
    ISBN9781524230968
    NaNoWriMo: A Cheater's Guide: Write Better Books, #1
    Author

    Laura Roberts

    Laura Roberts can leg-press an average-sized sumo wrestler, has nearly been drowned off the coast of Hawaii, and tells lies for a living. She is the founding editor of Black Heart Magazine, the San Diego Chapter Leader for the Nonfiction Authors Association, and publishes whatever strikes her fancy at Buttontapper Press. She currently lives in an Apocalypse-proof bunker in sunny SoCal with her artist husband and their literary kitties, and can be found on Twitter @originaloflaura. Blurring the lines between fact and fiction, Laura has penned the alphabetical travel guides Montreal from A to Z and San Diego from A to Z, offbeat writing guides A Cheater’s Guide to NaNoWriMo and Confessions of a 3-Day Novelist, and the satirical adventure tale, Ninjas of the 512. She is also the editor of the collection Haiku for Lovers, and the forthcoming anthology Everything I Need to Know About Love I Learned from Pop Songs (February 2016).

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      Book preview

      NaNoWriMo - Laura Roberts

      INTRODUCTION

      Never won a National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) before? Struggling to figure out what you’re doing wrong?

      You need to start cheating.

      Your mother may have told you that cheaters never win, and winners never cheat, but put that bunkum aside.

      Winners work the system.

      Winners use the tools to their own advantage.

      Winners never stop writing.

      And winners sure as hell don't believe that writing The End just because you hit 50K means you wrote a successful novel.

      The Cheater’s Guide to NaNoWriMo will hold your hand through all of the tips, tricks, cheats and hacks you'll need to finally finish that novel, get it off your hard drive, and publish it where real people can actually read it.

      You may not become the next Stephen King, but you will finish your novel and win NaNoWriMo this year.

      Ready to learn how? Join the Cheaters and beat the system.

      CHAPTER 1: THE SPIRIT OF NANOWRIMO

      I love the spirit of NaNoWriMo, because even if you're not working on a novel, you'll always run into writers during the month of November. As a professional writer, I can assure you that this doesn't happen every day. Writing is, indeed, a lonely business. Most of us writers tend to write on our computers in our houses, alone, and never meet other writers unless we're at special writers conferences or events.

      But during November, everyone you meet could be a writer. That goes double if you're in a coffee shop!

      Seriously, ask the writers you see typing away madly – or standing in line for another cup of coffee looking jittery from their 200th cup of the stuff, frazzled about what their main character will do while they’re away from the keyboard – about their novels. It's bound to be fascinating.

      We writers very rarely get to enjoy any kind of real-life professional or personal community, where we can talk to other writers about the task of writing. But during November, you need only look as far as your Facebook page or Twitter feed to find thousands of people talking about writing.

      It's truly inspiring.

      Which is why I always want to write a book during the month of November. It's almost inescapable, really.

      Plus, it makes you feel a lot less weird about wearing pajamas around the house all day long, muttering to yourself about imaginary people, drinking too much coffee, and otherwise acting like a crazy person – as we writers are wont to do.

      CHAPTER 2: DEFINE CHEATING

      Why would anyone cheat at NaNoWriMo?

      First, let’s talk about the definition of a cheater.

      There are lots of reasons to play by the rules, when it comes to NaNoWriMo, particularly if this is your first time.

      But if you’ve tried to win in the past and have never quite made it – or have never quite gotten a fully-formed first draft out of it – you might want to rethink your goals.

      You see, NaNoWriMo is all about hitting an arbitrary word count (50,000 words) and calling it a finished manuscript. While that may work for some people, lots of us don’t usually write that way.

      Writing to hit a word count can be fun, especially if it’s the first time you’ve ever tried writing anything as large as a novel. But if you’re on your second or third or tenth time out and just want to make it to 50K, well, it’s possible that this system doesn’t work for you.

      Here’s where the concept of cheating comes in.

      My definition of winning means that IF YOU FINISH WRITING THE BOOK YOU SET OUT TO WRITE, YOU’VE WON.

      Notice I didn’t say hit 50K. Or complete it by November 30.

      For me, what works about NaNoWriMo is that you've got a 30-day window to focus on your book. Maybe that’s a work of fiction, or maybe it’s a nonfictional manuscript like A Cheater’s Guide to NaNoWriMo. (Yes, I wrote this book ‘for NaNoWriMo one year!) But whatever you choose to do, you’ve got 30 days to do it. And if your book doesn’t need to be 50,000 words, why would you want to force it?

      In the end, the only person who can truly decide whether a book is done is its author. And if you finish your book, by your own merits – at

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