NaNoWriMo

Reading meet Sunday afternoon (13th)

I’m now doing the mid month meet in Reading.

Sunday 16th 2pm to 4pm

Coffee Republic Broad Street, Reading

fpkk did say we could have the downstairs area. If that’s still on I’ll be down there. If not there, then in the main shop. In any case I shall have a NaNoWriMo A4 page on/by the table wherever it is.

Bring your story/problems. I’ll also bring the novel help matrix (from London ML, copy on my website) which can be fun and possibly some help.

I’ll be there. Hope you will too.

Raymond Cuttill

Novel emergency matrix!

	My main character is totally boring!	My plot makes absolutely no sense!	I’m 10,000 words behind!	I’ve run out of story with 5000 words to go!	Real life is interfering with my novel!
My main character is totally boring!	Kill him|her off and focus on secondary one	MC wakes up from nightmare & begins real adventure!	Have MC mature and grow in a new direction	Change genre’s midstream. Combine two favorites.	Take out your frustrations on your main character.
My plot makes absolutely no sense!	Add a ninja. Or a ninja monkey!	Embrace the insanity!  Make things even crazier.	Have your town be invaded by pirates.	Introduce a late-in-the-game tragedy	Make it more realistic with real-life elements!
I’m 10,000 words behind!	Have your main character go insane-then write about it!	Insanity=word count! Add totally random scenes.	Flashbacks!  Alternate endings! Evil twins! Meanwhile …	Time travel! Cloning! Alternative Universes!	Leave the house for the day or take the day off work.
I’ve run out of story with 5000 words to go!	Have a lengthy death scene for your character!	Get all your characters drunk and see what happens!	Change it to choose your own adventure!	Write the last scene a few times based on different character POV	Start eavesdropping and add in what you hear.
Real life is interfering with my novel!	Turn people in your life into characters in your novel!	Turn your life problems into plot ideas for your novel!	Pay off your family to stay out of your way.	Revenge fantasies should wrap things up well.	Beg, bribe, blackmail, or barter with the interruptions.

See Novel Help Topic for more info

The Randomizer Novel Rescue Companion

Select your emergency and roll a dice to pick a row
	Plot emergency	Character emergency	Setting emergency	Dialogue emergency	Word count emergency	Real life emergency
1	Give one of your characters a fatal illness.	Ride the bus for an hour.  All the characters you could ever possibly want will be there!	Go to Google Maps and type in a random address in a random city.  See what you get!	Go to the NaNoWriMo chat room and start taking notes.	Give one of your characters Tourette’s Syndrome	Go to the emergency room.  Use the situations you find there in your novel.
2	Add a talking animal to your novel.	Sit in the food court at a mall and spy on the people around you.	Go to flickr.com and choose a random photo under “everyone’s photos.” Use it as your setting.	Start carrying a tape recorder and transcribing all of your conversations.	Have the two least unlikely characters get married.  Involve a mother-in-law.	Call 999.  (Only if it’s a real emergency.) Take the day off from your novel.
3	Have one of your characters suddenly discover that they are a superhero.	Go to blogger.com and choose their “random blog” option.  Use the blogger as your character.	Choose another regional lounge and go ask questions about the area.	Watch tv for a little while and jot down ideas.	Have one of your characters lapse into lengthy flashbacks. If you can’t go forward, go backwards!	Take the day off work to catch up on your real life stuff and then get back on schedule with your writing.
4	Have one of your characters suddenly become naked.	Have your alter ego become a character in the novel.	Make up your own city or country.	Turn on talk radio.  Listen to what they’re saying and then turn it around somehow.	Write your inner monologue as it occurs in your head.  Nothing to do with the novel?  Who cares!	Call the police. Once your real life emergency is solved, ask them for any good stories that would help with your novel.
5	Give your characters totally random fears.  Examples include: shrubbery, air, green things, not green things, and pants.	Give one of your characters the Subway commercial complex – they think they have super powers but don’t.	Create an alternate reality to our world. Perhaps it is a world without donuts.  Or a world without shrimp.  Or a world with only shrimp.	Listen in on someone’s mobile phone conversation and then write the other side of it.	Have a battle suddenly break out mid-novel. Multiple battles sure beefed up the word count for Tolkien!	Call your mother.  They can fix almost anything. While you’ve got her on the phone, get her to tell you a story. Add it to the novel.
6	Make it opposite day in your novel. Have hilarity ensue as a result of misunderstandings.	Add a giant to your novel. Make sure he doesn’t squash your main character unless the main character is the problem.	Time travel! Keep the location the same, just change the time.	Eavesdrop on a playground.  Little kids always have the best conversations.	Introduce a character named Mr. Unnecessary Exposition.  Have him explain everything repeatedly.	Leave the country. Take your laptop.

See Novel Help Topic for more info

Help with your novel - Revised

There's a Word version of the novel randomizers at the Zokutou site (London based creative writers group).  The site is at Zokutou and the Word file is at Writers' tools. At the bottom it is labelled "emergency novel helper (.doc)".  Right click and choose save as.. to save it to your PC.

Help with your novel? Maybe

This is scanned in but dind't come out very well.  I should rescan at a higher density but the cat is asleep on the scanner.  Honest!

This was given to me by Trish at the London Kick Off meeting. The original author has given permission to put it online. See NaNoWriMo Forum - London Kick Off meeting for details. Actually they've come out terrible and I will rescan them in a day or two.