Word Dumps and Picture Books

NaNoWriMo has well and truly finished and I was so pleased that I was able to get out 50,000 words by the end of the month.

It was an interesting exercise. First of all I had to switch off my editor mode. Now, I’m not much of an editor in terms of grammar, punctuation and even spelling but I do have a knack for going over and over my writing, adding a little here and deleting a little there. But I wasn’t allowed to do that.

It was a big word dump. I found the first 10,000 words relatively easy to get out but by the time I got to 35,000 words, man was it a slog. I prayed a whole lot during those last couple of weeks.

The whole NaNoWriMo process was quite liberating, in a way. I started writing with little knowledge of what I was actually going to end up with. I sort of had a vague idea of what maybe I should be heading towards but I was constantly surprised with the new characters and issues that cropped up along the way.

I’ve been advised to leave the writing or typing on that particular project for at least a few weeks before going back for a more serious edit. So I’m having fun with other projects at the moment.

I have started doing a course on writing picture books. 

Oh boy, I’m in my second week and I feel like I have jumped into the deep end. A couple of years ago, before I attempted to write a picture book, I thought picture books would be a fun and easy way of writing. Then I tried to write a couple of picture books and discovered that it’s not that simple. Then I started this course and I’m fast coming to the conclusion that picture books may well be the hardest type of book to write.

Try writing a well structured, well paced, age appropriate, emotional, themed story that has good characters, humour, a great topic, has passion, conflict and a great resolution, amongst other things, in 500 words. 

And don’t let me get started on all the ins and outs on working with an illustrator.

I take my hat off to all the wonderfully creative people who write gorgeous picture books for us to enjoy. Because lets face it picture books are fun for adults too. J

I am learning so much, I only hope my brain as the capacity to retain a little of it.