6 Sentence Sunday to Start NaNoWriMo

Image: Creative Commons

My calendar appears faulty: it doesn't show Movember, nor NaNoWriMo. And the daily entry stubbornly displays a simple "Sunday," not “Six Sentence Sunday.”


Movember, as many of you know, is that thirty-day period between Hallowe’en and the beginning of December when men around the world grow ’staches to raise awareness of prostate cancer — and sometimes money, too. (I observe and celebrate Movember all year round.)

And is there a reader who has not heard of National Novel Writing Month, variously abbreviated as NaNoMo and NaNoWriMo? The idea is that you write a novel-length story, 50,000 words, through the same period as Movember. That’s 1,666.66 words per day. It’s a great device for getting past all the procrastination and excuses and just getting that novel done.

And of course, Six-Sentence Sunday is that tradition begun by author Sara Brookes where writers post six consecutive sentences from a published novel or work in progress onto their blog on Sunday mornings. Participants list their blog links on the 6 Sentence Sunday website. The site now posts close to 200 participants every week. It’s a great way to find new authors, and new readers — particularly those of you reading this right now who got here from that site.

As regular Written Words readers will know, I like to mash ideas together. Today, I’m combining Six Sentence Sunday, NaNoMo and the latest Written Words series on style, and presenting six sentences from my latest WIP, One Shade of Red.

Yes, you guessed right: it’s a parody of the clumsy best-seller, Fifty Shades of Gray. EL James wrote the modern woman’s sexual fantasy; just for fun, I’m going to present the modern Western man’s ultimate fantasy woman in the form of Alexis Rosse.

Don’t worry, I didn’t forget Movember: I’m writing wearing nothing but my moustache.

For my first six-sentence excerpt from this work, I present my parody on the scene in Fifty Shades where the heroine, the absurdly named Anastasia Steele, falls into the office of the equally unbelievably named Christian Grey:

The canvas bag, loaded with accessories and supplies, vomited all over the stone walk. The aluminum pole hit the ground and bounced up, smacking me in the face as I went down. I barely got one hand under my face before it hit the stone, too.

“Oh, dear! Are you all right?” said the musical voice — nothing like the buzzy squawk from the speaker by the front door.

I craned my head up. She was a dream —my dream.

Like it? Hate it? Leave a comment below, then go visit sixsunday.com for more samples!