No Plot? No Problem!: A Low-Stress, High-Velocity Guide to Writing ... by Chris Baty

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I think this book would have been more helpful if I hadn't done NaNoWriMo so many times before reading it, or if NaNoWriMo wasn't as established as it is now (this book was written a few years in). As it was, there weren't a ton of "tips" that I hadn't already tried or found my own workaround for, and it really read like a longer version of the weekly pep talks. Still, I can see how it could be useful for someone who was attempting NaNo for the first time, or someone who felt nervous about the undertaking. I think reading it did allow me to "let go" and "write badly" a little more than in previous years (maybe that's why this NaNo seemed easier?), and the chapter on revision at the end is especially helpful, and makes some suggestions for revision that I haven't used before and that might be useful to me. I liked the humor and the "can-do" tone of the book, although the attempts at humor that masqueraded as dubious advice (i.e.: how to get away with writing your novel at work) got on my nerves, and made me glad that I didn't marry Chris Baty after all. [I used to have fantasies about marrying him because, you know, he started NaNoWriMo.]