Finishing a Novel for NaNoWriMo2021: How’s it going to end?

It’s another year, another November, and NaNoWriMo is here. I’m about nine days too late for writing this introduction post, but better late than never, right? 

Around Halloween, I was starting to agonize over what I was going to write in November. Should I try short stories? Should I even try at all? On the first day of NaNoWriMo, I ended up writing about a thousand words of a nonfiction piece that turned into an assignment for an online workshop I’m taking provided by The Writer’s Studio. Oh well.

I decided I didn’t want to expand on that nonfiction piece for 50,000 words, so I scrapped it and wrote three hundred words about a teen girl being hunted by a coven of witches. I can’t shake witches; they’re in my blood.

No, I don’t want to write another novel about witches, so I chucked that idea out the window and started going over the novels I attempted to complete for NaNoWriMo’s in 2020 and 2019. Low and behold, the two novels I had failed to complete are still vaguely interesting.

I decided to pick up the one from 2019, titled Jack’s Story, and run with it. Now I’m editing about 17k words as I catch up in the story. It’s not that bad, I’m surprised, and for once, it appears I’ve written part of a novel that isn’t tainted by the supernatural…for now.

So that’s where I’m at; I’m going to work on Jack’s Story for this month and see where it takes me.

A brief synopsis of Jack’s Story:

Jack is a twenty-something downbeat guy trying to manage his mental illness when he finds out one of his ex-girlfriends was brutally murdered. As he reconnects with family and friends, his past comes back to haunt him.

Check out my NaNoWriMo2021 project here!

I think finishing this novel is a good challenge for me this month while I juggle the workshop. While I’m working on all of this, I’ve been revamping my Medium blog, prepping to post a selection of nonfiction pieces centered around San Francisco. So far, I have one piece published, and you can check it out here.

Stay tuned!

Are you participating in NaNoWriMo 2021? Let’s talk! Leave a comment below or message me. I want to hear from you!


Today is the Day Sirens Scream [a poem]

She slips into something more comfortable, a beaming

grin with sly eyes and slinks towards the edge of the

water. A toe in the icy blue, a shiver up her leg. Today is

the day the sirens scream will alert everyone. Today is

the day, the froth of clouds above will become the

canvass to a scene of despair below. She untangles her

bikini and inches into the water, drowning out the sounds

of the children playing, the people laughing on the beach with

each sloshing step. Closer, closer to the depths, another shiver races

up her spine to rest at the base of her neck like a necklace of ice.

She takes in a breath, but not too big, shudders, and dives into the black.