http://www.scriptfrenzy.org/whatisscriptfrenzy

I’m having NaNoWriMoDejaVu. And I don’t even have to wait for November.

The Script Frenzy website works the same way NaNoWriMo.org works, since it’s brought to you by the same people who created NaNoWriMo. For most participants, April will be spent working on the scripts they’ve always wanted to write. But then…there are the Screnzy Rebels. (We’re such rebels, we don’t even call Script Frenzy by its full name!)

NaNoWriMo has rebels, too, participants who work on writing projects other than novels. Screnzy Rebels work on writing projects other than scripts. (Novels, for example.) The idea is not to cheat, but to adjust the challenge so you’re still working toward a significant personal goal. The main purpose of challenges like these is to get you to write, and to set a goal, then do the work needed to meet it. In the process, hopefully, you discover that you’re able to write much better, and faster, than you previously thought. If you’re able to do that, it doesn’t make much difference if you do it by writing a novel or by writing a script.

I wasn’t going to sign up for Script Frenzy, but I decided to take a peek at their site this morning. Immediately, I found threads on their forums from people who intend to write novels instead of scripts. Since the site is very similar to NaNoWriMo.org, it’s possible to use the site to “do NaNo” in April. (You will have to decide on what your goal is in terms of pages, instead of word count, and the process of validating your finished work is slightly different. If you would ordinarily aim for 50K words during NaNo, you can define a “page” as 500 words. If you reach your 50K word count by the end of the month, you would have then finished 100 pages, the amount needed to win Script Frenzy.)

Of course, to get the full benefit of the website, and to experience the challenge as its creators intended, you should consider writing a script. That’s what most of the people on their forums will be doing. That’s what the website is geared to help you do. There are links, in the writers’ resources section, that will help you understand how to format and write scripts, if you’re unfamiliar with the process. You’ll learn and grow more as a writer, if you follow the challenge, instead of making up your own rules.

Unless you’re one of the people who wishes NaNo came more than only once a year, and you were set on writing a novel anyway.

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