It’s that time of year again…when all your friends who want to be writers attempt the nigh-impossible: write 50,000 words in 30 days.

My wife is going to kill me, but I’m going to try it again this year. I’ve succeeded the last two years, but this year….I’m not as confident. Part of it is time commitments, part of it that I want the novel this year to be, well, decent.

What you hear is true: if this is your first year, give yourself permission to write crap. Personally, I believe that if you’ve done more than one, it’s time for the work to stop sucking. I might be a little pretentious here, but I know that I can do better than what I’ve done in the past. Each year, I’ve learned something important about the process. The first, I learned about pacing and stamina…the need to have things unfold gradually, and how to sustain tension throughout the narrative. Last year, I learned about characterization, about creating people who come to life on the page. This year…it’s all about the plot.

Plot eludes me. I can start the story, but I cannot track it, see where it goes, and fill it out. I’m going to be outlining this year and planning things out. Admittedly…time is short for such things, which means that I’ll probably fall behind early. It’s worth not finishing if I can get this down.

**Tools for This Year**

1. [Scrivener](http://www.literatureandlatte.com/scrivener.html): J.C. Hutchins turned me on to this program, and it is made of awesome. It is a wondrous piece of programming that has everything you could need…outlining, corkboard, formatting, exporting to specific formats, fullscreen mode, wiki-like linking, folders and formats for templates…everything. It’s well worth the $34.99.

2. [Holly Lisle's Create a Plot Clinic](http://shop.hollylisle.com/index.php?crn=211&rn=375&action=show_detail): [Jason Penney](http://www.jasonpenney.net) recommended this to me, and so far, it’s really quite good. It’s a practical guide to plotting, which is something I desperately need.

3. [The Nanomonkeys](http://www.teampodcasts.net/nanomonkeys): Sure, I might be the guy mixing down all the shows for this daily podcast, but I need the

advice as much as the next guy.

I’m torn on the actually subject matter for the book…I have four different settings to choose from, and two of those are not fully baked yet. The two that remain are Autumn Falls, a midwestern, modern day supernatural fantasy piece, or Sacred Third, which is more of a steampunk piece. I’ll admit my steampunk chops are weak at best, but I have a couple of great characters in mind for there. Autumn Falls is more fleshed out setting-wise, but the characters are flat.

Guess I’d better make up my mind, and quickly. Any thoughts? Please…leave comments.

I’ll be tracking my progress on the sidebar over to the right. Feel free to play along at home.