It's a bit like NaNoWriMo...only you've got about a tenth of the time to finish an entire novel! The winner gets published. Check it out at:

http://www.3daynovel.com/

Crazy!

I might just have to try it

Apparently - you can collaborate?

Sarah

You can't submit a novel you've already written - it's got to be written over that weekend ... and you need a witness. Yeah, right. As long as you don't submit War and Peace, then who can call you on submitting an already completed draft, so long as you get a chum to perjure himself/herself? Or you can even impersonate your own witness.

What's the entry fee? $50? I wonder how much the proprietors make out of this. Not much, I bet, IF EVERYONE PLAYS BY THE RULES, because how many people are capable of writing a 'novel' in three days? But they won't, will they?

Ah, but it's only 100 double-spaced typed pages, so they say. I reckon that's 30,000 words top whack. 10,000 words a day ... 500 words an hour for twenty hours a day, two ten hour shifts, with a two hour shower break in between shifts ... keep going with coffee and whizz. Forget editing and redrafting. Hmm, sounds do-able. Where's my Corona?

"Once upon a time ...."

Jim

As a way to force yourself outside all your inhibitions and get something down to be revised, it's not bad...

Emma

I don't agree with you there, Emma ... 'getting something down to be revised' doesn't cut it for me. I can see all sorts of arguments about getting started, beating 'block' and so on, but no, this is just plain unerealistic. Monkeys and typewriters anyone? Look at the sheer physical demands of this challenge (if you follow the rules, which no-one will, as the organisers know ... as they collect their $50 punts). For example, a lot of the stuff I write, under slow-burn conditions, doesn't need revision ... it needs burning by the public hangman.

But who knows? A decent book may be looming.

Jim

Well, it would be more like free writing, wouldn't it: there might be a kernel in there that makes a novel, or there might not be. Depends what kind of writer you are, whether it's likely to be a good start. It's certainly not more than a start, good or bad.

Emma