Tag: NaNoWriMo

NaNoWriMo Success!

AJ.Dixon27 Comments

Hello, WordPress!

As some of you may be aware, I took the plunge this year and took part in National Novel Writing Month (Nanowrimo hereafter), a challenge in which participants aim to write 50,000 words of a novel in 30 days. Today I am ecstatic to report that I am one of those who succeeded, as this afternoon I validated my word count at 50,116 words! My novel isn’t finished but I am over the moon and filled with new confidence about my writing. I now know for certain that I can make time to write every single day regardless of what I have going on. It’s an eye-opening and exciting thing to realise!

However, putting in the effort has had some downsides. First of all, my poor blog has been neglected this month despite me promising myself to add and update or two. To be honest, everything got put on hold for Nanowrimo: WordPress, my social life, my various smaller projects and my music practice all had to be shelved for the duration of the challenge. I still managed to find time to read, though, as I can’t be doing without books! Nonetheless, I have no regrets over taking part as I have thoroughly enjoyed it and I have great pride in myself for seeing it through. I plan to right some of these wrongs starting today, and I’ll return to writing short stories to post on here shortly. I’ll also be kick-starting my ‘Fiction Fursday’ posts once again and doing my best to keep up with any writing competitions and challenges thrown my way. I’m planning on catching up with you wonderful people on the blogosphere, too, so that will be great fun!

Anyway, thanks for taking the time to read, as always, and I’ll look forward to interacting with you soon! Well done to anyone else who took part in Nanowrimo this year. Win or lose, you’re all writers to me!

An Update & a Reblog!

AJ.Dixon3 Comments

Good evening, all! Happy Hallowe’en and have fun with your ghoulish night of tricks, treats and stuffing yourself to the eyeballs with sweeties!

Now, some of you may have noticed that I have been a bit lax recently with my blog. Whilst my inactivity saddens me, it is mainly due to the fact that I have been gearing up to take part in this year’s National Novel Writing Month (Nanowrimo for short) and that has taken up a large portion of my writing time. Because of this, I have been unable to pen a horror story for this evening, but I will instead provide the link to a short story I wrote back in April, entitled “Unreal“. In fact, I wrote this piece as part of a different writing challenge, which was actually undertaken as a warm-up to Nanowrimo! I hope that it will suffice and that you enjoy reading it if you haven’t already.

I have a small pile of completed stories, both new and old, which I will be posting throughout November, as well as providing updates on my Nanowrimo progress as I slog through it. I apologise in advance for the lack of routine, and I will get straight back on to working on my ‘Fiction Fursday’ stories in December, which I am thrilled to say have been quite successful!

Enjoy your evening, one and all, and if any of you are getting involved in Nanowrimo , please get in touch!

 

UNREAL
By Adam Dixon

Jack could hardly believe the realism of the game. As soon as he pulled down the visor-screen he could almost swear that he was standing in a meadow during the height of summer, rather than sat in his ergonomic gaming chair in his draughty South-London flat. He could nearly feel the grass tickling his feet and taste the pollen in the air. The box containing the virtual reality system boasted “A gaming world so real, it’ll leave you drained!” It certainly was visually impressive.

“Wow,” he whistled in appreciation. “Pretty good start!” He glanced down at himself and marvelled at the physique of his chosen character. He gazed in wonder at a bare torso covered with rippling, solid muscle and saw equally strong legs supporting him. He almost whooped in delight. He was just like Conan the Barbarian!…

Click here to read on, if you dare…