In honor of National Novel Writing Month, I have a little event on my blog for anyone one who needs an extra boost of motivation to get their current project rolling. If you don't know about Nanowrmo, National Novel Writing Month, this is a fun, seat-of-your-pants approach to novel writing. Participants begin writing November 1. The goal is to write a 175-page (50,000-word) novel by midnight, November 30. This is a kamakazie approach to writing, it's about quanity and not quality.
The Golden Coffee Cup is a different kind of motivational thingy. This coveted award (an awesome picture of a coffee cup emailed to you that you may display it with pride) will be given to the successful November goal setters.
EXTRA, EXTRA INCENTIVE!!!!! Four lucky winners will receive a card good for a real paper cup of genuine coffee. Winners will need to send me(molly.blaisdell@verizon.net)their address to receive their card.
This is my answer to that "interesting concept" (cough, cough) of requiring writers to churn out 50,000 incomprehensible words in one month. I do the judging and it is wholly subjective. You do not have to be my friend to win, really, honestly, cross my heart hope to die stick a needle in my eye.
THE RULES:
1. Post your November creative goals here by Nov 1. That is the deadline, folks.
2. Come back weekly for general cheering and wild ruckus, celebrating your successes. We'll do some holy snappin'. For extra motivation, celebrity guests will be on hand to offer high fives for your achievements!
3. If you reach your goal from Nov 23 to Nov 30, and post on blog, you will be recieve your Golden Coffee Cup picture. There is no verification process, I believe you. Send in your email address to molly.blaisdell@verizon.net and your Golden Coffee Cup picture will be emailed to you. Display it proudly as wallpaper, post it on your blog, print it out and tack it on your bulletin board for year-long motivation. Write a great post and you might win the real coffee!
GOAL GUIDELINES:
The Golden Coffee Cup is about making a goal and keeping it.
If you are a novel writer, you can write something new with a realistic word count goal, keeping your life in mind. Your goal might also be making your first novel submission (think Delacorte Contest) or a revision of a novel you've already written. You can do this!
If you are a picture book writer or artist, hey, picture books are harder to write than they look. I don't really care about the word count because if your project is over 500 words that might be a problem. Picture book artists tell stories too. You might be an artist making a dummy and a dummy is certainly as hard to create as a novel. This is about quality not quantity.
Win your very own Golden Coffee Cup.
Let's bring some excellence into that creation!!!!!
I can't give you a peek at the THE Golden Coffee Cup but here are the Motivational Coffee Cups. Feel the power pouring into you!
Want to be featured in the 2008 Annual Golden Coffee Cup? Send me (molly.blaisdell@verizon.net) a digital picture that expresses your "High Five", a link to your blog, website or book, and up to three sentences of inspiration. This opportunity is open to children's writers and illustrators only. You do not need to be published. I will fit in as many as I can.
24 comments:
Yay, the Golden Coffee Cup is back! I'm participating with a vengeance this year.
Also...I hereby nominate Seize the day for the I Love Your Blog Award - see mine for details!
I too nominate Seize the day for the I Love Your Blog Award!
See my blog for details one and all.
Janet
Okay, Molly, here we go. During November I will write a 50,000 word draft YA novel. In honor of your excellent contest, I will place an allusion to either coffee or gold in each chapter.
The timing of the Golden Coffee Cup is perfect - I have a set of roughs for a picture book that I want to have complete by the end of the month. I'm in!
Thanks for the motivation! I usually write middle grade fiction, but have always wanted to break out and try YA. My goal will be to write 75 pages of on a draft by the end of the month. Scary! I'm not a coffee drinker but I will hoist my cup of tea in your honor each day! Trudi
Great goals so far! Welcome. Come on, folks, don't be shy! FYI: you get a coffee card but you can spend it on tea!
Molly :)
I'm in! My goal is to finish a draft of the picture book dummy I'm working on.
I'll spell it out in a post on my own blog.
Fun! Thanks, Molly.
Yay for the Golden Coffee Cup. I'm always up for coffee...as long as it's good! And this is good. My goal is to stive for going the NaNo distance, but really, getting a huge running start at a new project (no matter how many words).
Okay. I'm in. I'm going to shoot for the 50,000 words. If nothing else, I can check this off as 'having tried but not necessarily succeeded at". Like water skiing. And making the perfect daiquiri. And that whole thing with the alligator, the spatula and 6 feet of clothesline.
It was great seeing how motivational you are in person at a class for illustrators. Thanks for leaving the light on for us! My blog is art4kidz.blogspot.com
We can all meet under the stars! While I don't need a Golden Coffee Cup, I'm thrilled you've organized it again. I'll try drawing 50,000 lines. :0
Hi Molly,
My goal is to finish my book and mail the final draft to the editor by November 30. Pretty much have to-it's the darn deadline-but the Golden Coffee Cup fits right in the schedule. In honor of your award, I will put coffee in my Texas BBQ rub.
This is actually a hard month for goal setting -- because it should be a fairly easy month. I just turned in the third book in my new series (Yeehaw!), and don't have any major deadlines... at least so far, because they haven't told me when they want book 4. So my goals are to write an article for Children's Writer, sign with an agent, start researching book 4, and have a great time on my epic adventure with visiting Australian friends. But if my editor suddenly tells me he wants book 4 by January 1, everything else changes!
Chris Eboch
For Holly: Doh! Forgot to give you an official goal: to write 25,000 words on Street Creed or finish a first draft, whichever I hit first.
H
Hi, Molly!
Thanks for motivating me to to plunk down and push pass the mid-novel slump! My goal will be a draft of the last half--about 35,000 words.
Carole Estby Dagg
Thanks for this opportunity. My goal is to write every day without fail for the month of November. I'm working on a draft of an adult novel (my previous work is for children so this is new territory for me!)
~Michelle
Okay a day late!! But I'll post my goal anyway and hope it sticks.
This month I'll plunge into part three of BOUND BY THREE first draft writing at least 15 pages per week. IF however, my editor gets back to me with editorial letter for STEALING DEATH -- I'll switch-a-roo to working feverishly on that 6 days a week -- goal is Chunk of revision every day.
There you have it, Molly
Hi, Janet, this is the Golden Coffee Cup, this is the quality driven event and the rules are more like guidelines.
These are the imperatives:
1. Work steady
2. Be kind and resonable to yourself
3. Have fun
So glad to have you in; this is an impressive field of writers and artists. The amount of creative energy I feel here is like a star nursery -- the birth place of stars.
I did make some goals. I made them on November 1, but I didn't post them then. So I'm fudging on the deadline, Moll.
Here are my goals:
Work on the novel as much as I can before getting notes from the editor. If I get her notes this month, I will jump into the rewrite in earnest for as far as I can go. If she doesn't send her notes this month, I will begin working on the novel-in-verse. My goal is a minimum of half an hour a day working on my books, with a weekly minimum of ten hours. (That means I have to work on it every day, but some days I'll have to work on it more.) For the novel-in-verse (if I do work on it), I want to have a minimum of five poem drafts.
I like fudge. :)
Molly!
I promised to post last night, but I became so drunk on the thrill of winning the Golden Coffee Cup Award, that I plumb forgot. In my defense, I haven't slept much lately because I was busy MEETING MY GOAL of finishing my book. I'm sending it off today! Thank you for your inspiration, for your recipe testing, and for this Award. It is the first I've won since I received "Most Improved" on the soccer team my freshman year in high school.
Hooray Molly.
Ok, my goal is to bring a book out of the air and into its finished (at least completed in the sense of being editable and in tact) glory. Not setting page or word goals, but This is the month. PaBAM! On it!
Who knows where to download XRumer 5.0 Palladium?
Help, please. All recommend this program to effectively advertise on the Internet, this is the best program!
I've never done this before, but your system is more workable for me. My goal is to finish the first draft of my YA novel by Nov. 30. Thanks for doing this.
thanks
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