We’re coming upon that time of year again! (Okay, so November is still more than a couple months away but, as I learned last time, my kind of prep needs to start early!)

I actually couldn’t remember if I had decided that prepping needed to begin in September or August. Fortunately, I had last year’s posts to turn to for guidelines. I had a whole (rough) schedule laid out for myself, and it worked well for me for the most part, but I noticed some room for improvement.

I remembered that last time I had begun Inspirational Intake in October and that I found it didn’t give me enough to time for the amount of material I wanted to cover. So I decided to amend the existing plan by starting Inspirational Intake as early as September, continuing through into October if needed, but also using October as a time to re-watch or re-play any material I found to be particularly mood-setting. In other words – September is for the collecting of ideas, and October is for creating the mood/vibe/head-space that I need to maintain throughout November and even while finalizing ideas in late October.

The revised NaNoWriMo Prep plan is as follows…

Last Week of August: Create list of Inspirational Material (and a schedule for September if needed).

September: Begin Inspirational Intake (Movies, TV, Videogames, Music). Begin world-building (grand scale), character list, and basic plot.

First Week of September: Create Pinterest Board (kept private and uncategorized for now).

Second Week of September: Create Musical Playlist.

Last Week of September: Complete Core Cast of Characters.

October-November: Replay of mood-setting material.

First Week of October: Complete World-building (finer details).

Mid-October: Skeleton Plot with basic details for each scene.

Last Week of October: Greater Details for opening scene (or the first scene I plan to write).

November: Write!

Also November: Announce project on Blog. Make Pinterest Board public (but leave it uncategorized – no named characters yet).

After Publication (December-January?): Announce on Blog. Plan Launch Party. Categorize Pins on Pinterest Board.

Although launch parties might still be on hold until I know it’s safe to gather. Or I could do an online launch party. The options are there for me to mull over, and I’ve got quite a few months to think about it!

So for now, the only thing I have to do is finalize a list of inspirational material, and I’ve already got a pretty big list! In fact, there’s a good chance I’ll be going over some of this material and jotting down notes and ideas early, and marking anything I find helpful for mood-setting as something to go back to during October-November. For now, I’m just glad I got this to-do list sorted out ahead of time so that I know what aspects of prep to focus on in each week of the coming months. Come September I should be able to hit the ground running.

What about you? Do you have any pre-NaNoWriMo prep strategies? Share them in the comments! I’d love to hear from you 🙂