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Can You Write a Book in a Week?

© Roxianne Moore

Many books claim you can write a book in a month, or a year. But I haven't seen any yet that claim you can write one in a week.

So what's the deal with these Book-in-a-Week (BIAW) challenges? In case you haven't seen mention of them before, BIAW challenges are all about freewriting. The basic premise is that by turning off the internal editor, even for a single week, we can open up our creative floodgates. The result is pure "flow" writing, and the pages can pile up like magic.

The first time I did a BIAW challenge, through Romance Foretold, I wrote more than 70 pages. The first ten pages were written longhand during the return flight from a trip to London last February. Before starting the challenge, I had done some of the suggested prewriting exercises, and had my general plot and main characters firmly in mind. I was able to write quickly because I didn't have to ask myself what the characters were trying to accomplish or what they would do in a given situation.

On the other hand, as usually happens when I write, the characters often surprised me. Scenes I hadn't planned flowed from my pen -- or my fingertips. Once I was home, I found it easiest to continue at the keyboard, as it seemed pointless to write longhand and transfer to the computer. Some people, though, say their best freewriting is done longhand. So, you have to go with what works best for you.

I did a second challenge while I was on a fishing trip to Canada, and wrote more than 80 pages to my current WIP. This was all longhand, as I had no access to a computer. I found that this time, I edited and rearranged scenes as I input them into the computer.

I recently completed a third challenge, during which I wrote 35 pages despite having a nasty cold and three article deadlines. I had originally set a goal of 15 pages per day, but when I looked at my schedule, I knew I couldn't keep up with the pace while fighting off a cold. I changed my goal to 5 pages a day plus the nonfiction articles, and managed to succeed. Others on the list wrote anywhere from 1 page a day to 20 or more.

This one was through Painted Rock, which sponsors a monthly challenge. The email list is active all year, with writers offering support and informal chat between challenges. You can go on "no mail" in between challenges if you don't want the extra email cluttering your mailbox.