Two big things happened in my life during the past month. I’ll share the second one in a separate post, but the first one was the discovery of Preptober.

“What is Preptober?”, you ask. Why, it’s October, the month of Preparation for NaNoWriMo, of course.

NaNoWriMo

NaNoWriMo stands for National Novel Writing Month, a yearly event. Aspiring authors commit to writing 50,000 words of a new novel, during the month of November. This is my 19th consecutive year of participating. During my early years, it became a kind of family homeschooling event, with anywhere from one to five of my family members joining me in the endeavour. Even my husband, Ian, joined us one year, and produced a little book about a church mouse.

It didn’t take me long to discover that I am what is now known as a NaNo Rebel, because very few of those years did I actually follow the rules and stick to writing fiction. Thankfully, the “rules” have changed over the years, and there are probably more “rebels” than rule followers. I have a love-hate relationship with NaNoWriMo. I love that it gives me a reason to sit down and write every day during the month, but I hate that I have to reach that goal of 50,000 words by the end of the month.

Apparently the type of writing I do best is known as creative nonfiction – which means communicating information, just like a reporter, but shaping it in a way that reads like fiction. It seems to me it should not be a huge leap from creative nonfiction to fiction. Shouldn’t it be like writing a memoir, but changing all the names and places so that it is camouflaged? Well, it just isn’t that easy. I know, because I’ve tried it many times.

In recent months, I’ve been wanting to make a genuine effort to write fiction. We need really good Christian fiction, by authors who are not afraid to step out of the contemporary mold of wishy-washy, woke, watered down versions of Christianity, and write solid biblical truth into fictional stories.

We especially need this for our children and teens. I’m not sure I am up to writing for teens, but perhaps I could write a middle grade book, for children in the 8-12 year range.

I have a long way to go before I could come up with a good book that children would want to read. I need to learn my craft. And so this year, I was delighted to discover Preptober, with all its great ideas for how to prepare to write a fiction novel.

Preptober

I started with a plain blue hard cover notebook with dotted pages, two ribbon page markers, and an elastic to hold it closed. I added some stickers, stamps, and stencils, a ruler, a pen, and some markers, and voila! I now have a pretty little “writing journal” which is slowly filling up with helpful resources for writing fiction in general, and middle grade books in particular.

In his book, Following Christ, Charles Spurgeon says…

“What has been your special gift? You can speak well enough in the company of some people, but have you ever spoken for Christ? You can write well and you realize that you have a good gift in that area, but have you ever written a line that will bring your fellow men to the service of the Saviour?” ~ from Chapter 6: Being Faithful with the Talents He Already Gave Us

In the same chapter, Spurgeon goes on to say…

“Use all opportunities while you have hem, strike while the iron is hot, serve God today while you can! Let each golden moment have its pressing service given to God, lest it should be said to you, ‘Thou mayest be no longer steward.’”

There are lots of reasons a person’s talent or opportunity to serve the Lord may be taken away, and it may not be our fault at all. But may it never be that it’s taken through disuse or misuse. May we always be ready to serve the Lord in any way He sees fit.