NaNoWriMo’s Young Writers Program

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Author Michael Leali is your Camp Counselor this week. Find all Camp Care Packages in Breaking News throughout the month of April, or learn more about Camp NaNoWriMo!

1) "I can do hard things.":

You’ve put weeks of time, effort, energy, and emotion into your writing. I hope you’re reveling in all you’ve accomplished, but you might also feel depleted, even with the finish line in sight. When I get to this point in my writing, I focus on positive self-talk. I repeat to myself “I can do hard things.” Learning to be kind and affirming to myself has done wonders for my writing spirit, especially since this endeavor is largely a solo venture. What do you say to yourself as you write? How can you be kind and affirming to yourself today so that you reach your goal?

Writing Dare: What self-talk do your characters do? Write a short passage in which your character talks to themselves as a means of encouragement.

2) Try out a new perspective:

Feeling stuck? Maybe it’s time to shake things up and look at your work from a new perspective. That’s right—today’s all about point of view! For some reason, I’m often compelled to start my drafts in third limited, but my voice sometimes comes out stilted and disingenuous. When the voice is off, the whole manuscript can suffer.

Writing Dare: So, I’m going to challenge you the way my editor has challenged me: pick a scene and rewrite it from at least two different perspectives. Switch up tenses too. You might be surprised by what you discover!

author photo

Michael Leali is a writer and educator. He received his MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts. When he’s not dreaming up stories, he’s probably playing a board game, eating cheese, or grading papers somewhere in the suburbs of Chicago. The Civil War of Amos Abernathy is his debut novel. Michael Leali identifies as white, cisgender, gay, and uses he/him pronouns.

What's up at Camp?

NaNo Community Zoom Meetup — Thursday, April 28, 1:00 PM PDT. All writers in the NaNoWriMo community are invited to come to this virtual meetup to chat, write together, and meet other participants!
Camp NaNoWriMo Virtual Write-In — Friday, Apr 29, 2022, at 1:00 pm PDT. Join us as we dive into our Camp NaNoWriMo projects! Led by staff at NaNo HQ, this hour-long livestream is a place where we'll share some writing prompts to help you hit your goal this month, and where you can ask us questions or chat with other Wrimos from around the world.
Check out the winners of our 2022 "Now What?" Young Writers Contest! Read the Grand Prize Winners and Runners-Up.

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