Students explore different worlds and self-reflect during National Novel Writing Month

Nov. 26—TRAVERSE CITY — Four friends confront the tensions in their relationships while being hunted by a fantastical monster on a kayaking trip.

Two young girls set out on a hunt for the evil spirit that's terrorizing their summer sleep-away camp.

Long-lost twins fight against an oppressive government in a fantasy world.

These are all just glimpses into the novels that students at Traverse City West Middle School are writing for National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo.

NaNoWriMo is a nonprofit organization, but it's also a challenge to writers of all ages to write a 50,000-word novel this month. The nonprofit provides programming and resources to writers attempting to reach that goal.

This year, the National Writers Series Raising Writers program is working with Jacque Burke, the NaNoWriMo Municipal Liaison of the Grand Traverse Region, to support middle and high school students as they plan their novels, build their worlds and develop their characters. Burke also is working with the Teen Services Department at Traverse Area District Library to host workshops.

Burke uses resources from NaNoWriMo's Young Writers Program to work with her students through weekly workshops where they can get as close as they can to 20,000 words for their novels by the end of this month.

The workshops include a lot of time for the students to write and work on world-building and character development while bouncing ideas off of each other.

Burke also sometimes takes a "gamefied" writing approach, where students earn a certain amount of points based on the number of words they can get down by different parts of the game.

The goal through Burke's workshops is for every kid to have a polished first chapter or book synopsis to submit to the NWS literary journal for publication by the end of November, Burke said.

The workshop currently serves students from Children's House Montessori Middle School, Greenspire Middle School, Traverse City East Middle School, Traverse City Central High School and Traverse City West Middle School.

For NaNoWriMo, Olivia Reding, an eighth-grader at West Middle School, is working on a fantasy adventure story about a girl who lives in a divided country that has been conquered by a government that has begun rounding up people with magical potential.

She's still working out the details of her story, and she's trying to make her cast of characters diverse. She wants to include people from the LGBTQIA community and people from different backgrounds and races.

"I felt like humanity is really important in a good book," Reding said.

Reding said she likes to write fantasy because it allows her to use her creativity as much as she wants without the boundaries of reality.

Ava Lark, a sixth-grader at West Middle School, is writing a fiction novel about a girl who experiences anxiety for NaNoWriMo. Lark's main character continues to overcome changes and challenges that cause her anxiety, despite her over-thinking.

Working on this novel has helped Lark think more about her own struggle with anxiety and come up with the words to talk about her experience, she said.

Lark said she's always liked writing on her own, but coming to the workshop has been a good way to stay motivated and connect with other writers.

"I always liked writing and when I tried to do it on my own time, I always kind of forget about it and just stop," Lark said. "Coming to the classes keeps me doing it."

Students in other parts of the region are working toward finishing a novel for NaNoWriMo as well.

For the past six years, Rebecca Hubbard's creative writing class at Frankfort High School has participated in NaNoWriMo.

Hubbard encourages her students to write 1,500 to 2,000 words per week. There's little pressure to have a complete novel by the end, but she has had three students complete 50,000-word novels before.

For those who hit that milestone, she promises to bake them a cake.

Some of her other students return to their novels for different projects throughout the school year or during November, year after year.

"It's beautiful to see a kid have a long-term project like that, especially through something like the pandemic, and to learn that something like writing can be something that you do for yourself, not just for other people," Hubbard said, "that it can be something that feeds you creatively."

By the end of the month, Hubbard said her students are typically tired of their novels, but they also develop an appreciation for the work that goes into writing a novel. They also learn to drown out their inner critic to write forward, or writing to get the piece done, rather than focusing on perfecting their prose.

Alex Holmes is a senior in Hubbard's writing class at Frankfort who is currently working on a horror novel that takes place in a hotel for NaNoWriMo.

Holmes has been writing since she was 9. She prefers poetry, which is why she was disappointed to hear that her creative writing class was going to be focusing on long-form writing projects during November this year.

While working on her novel, Holmes said she has struggled with motivation and focus, but as November is coming to a close, she's looking back on the month with gratitude. The experience has helped her expand her vocabulary, develop better pacing in her writing and build a story that can keep going.

"I have never been able to keep on going for more than three pages and, now, I've been able to get to about six, and I'm still in the beginning," Holmes said. "I'm really proud of myself for getting that far."

Aside from her students growing as writers, Hubbard's hope for the month is that her students have fun and get to express themselves creatively, which kids don't often have the time to do these days, she said.

And they really do get creative.

Hubbard's students write about a variety of topics across different genres, from horror, like Holmes's, to novels based on Taylor Swift songs. Some write more personal stories that can be heartbreaking, while others take on science fiction tales that remind her of Ray Bradbury.

"I read everything," Hubbard said. "And none of it's boring."

Individuals looking to connect with the local NaNoWriMo group can connect through the group's Facebook page or email them at tcwrimos@gmail.com.