After my bold statement last month on how I was going to participate in NaNoWriMo, you must have been wandering, where have I gone this whole month?
(Or maybe you haven’t, but let’s assume that you have.)
I am going to answer that question by letting you know where I am right now, as I believe it describes what had been happening in November for me:
With the end of October only a few days away, I really have to work on my NaNoWriMo project outline on my writer’s notebook, which I have rather abandoned last week because I went on a vacation. Problem is—plotting or outlining has never been my strong point.
This is especially a big problem when I have so little time left to prepare, despite all the bragging and announcements I made at the start of Preptober. I really need a crash course on plotting, and I need it quick. But at the same time, I have to make up somehow for not posting anything last week on this website.
I obviously couldn’t focus on both. So imagine how glad I was when my good author friend, Yarii, who writes amazing historical fiction herself, agreed to write a guest blog post on my website to talk about plotting.
With her contribution, I thought, I could post something new on my website, plus I could learn a thing or two from her. It’s like hitting two birds with one stone.
And boy, was I right.
In any case, I’m planning to start posting regularly on my blog after I finished my outline, so please feel free to follow the blog or any of my social media (Twitter, Instagram) if you’re interested in my struggles during the upcoming NaNoWriMo, or even if you just want to know what I did during my short getaway several days ago.
Okay, I’ll stop with my ramblings and get into Yarii’s guest post about plotting below. If you find the article below helpful, please check out her works. She just independently published her book, Botan, and it is now widely available for purchase through this link. If you like historical fiction, or if you like Japanese culture, you definitely have to get the book!
So, I found this inside my mailbox today:
And for the first time since the long and arduous second week of October started, I was reminded that I am going to participate in NaNoWriMo 2017.
Now, of course it wasn’t like I suddenly woke up one day and forgot such an important event. After all, I did make an announcement of my participation in a previous blog post. And it wasn’t like I completely did nothing in preparation. I have a legit list of all the things I need to prepare in Preptober, including purchasing a dedicated writer’s notebook for myself—which I did last week.
Whether it is your day job or an exam coming up in school, life always seems so busy in the months leading up to November.
Or… is it? Continue reading “Preptober Week 2: Planning for NaNoWriMo 2017 on a Busy Week”
If you have been following me on Twitter, you might have already known that I recently purchased a Midori style traveler’s notebook from a local leather craftsman.
If you’re not familiar with the concept, Midori Traveler’s Notebook is basically a notebook setup that consists of a slab of leather with several elastics on the spine of the cover to keep notebooks inside. People use the setup for a bullet journal, a daily planner, a diary, a traveler’s log, and even a creative journal.
Unsurprisingly, the minimalistic approach from this Japanese company (now Traveler’s Company) immediately took the planner community by storm. The sporadic distribution and sudden fame of the lineup brought about a very devout following in the community, and it had become one of the most popular choices for people looking for a notebook setup.
This, of course, opened up some rooms for business. Numerous local craftsmen had been creating their own versions of Midori Traveler’s Notebook, dubbed fauxdori. Not only are these fauxdori cheaper than the original Midori variant, they are also more customizable since you can just talk about your needs to the craftsman and they would adjust the product for you.
So that means, you could make the leather cover a tad wider, taller, or has some engravings if that’s what you fancy. This adds to the customizability of the setup, and both the original version and fauxdori had been garnering quite some followings on the internet.
Continue reading “How I Use a Midori Style Traveler’s Notebook to Prepare for NaNoWriMo 2017”
If the banner above hasn’t given away what I’m about to write in this post, then let me clarify it for you:
This shouldn’t be very surprising, since I have talked about how I wrote my debut novel, 3 (Tiga) as a NaNoWriMo project.
In case you didn’t know already, NaNoWriMo is an event in which writers from all around the globe attempt a very grand challenge of finishing a 50,000 words novel in the month of November. This year would be the fifth time I’m participating. So far, I have only won one of them—so clearly I have to step up my game in order to even dream of completing a new manuscript.
Continue reading “NaNoWriMo 2017 + My Thoughts on the Dreaded Preptober”
Alicia Lidwina 
