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Kobo Writing Life Podcast


The Kobo Writing Life Podcast brings you insights and inspiration for growing your self-publishing business. We feature interviews with bestselling authors and industry experts, who share practical advice you can use to improve your writing and sell more books. Hosted by the Kobo Writing Life team, you'll also get the latest news and updates about Kobo and the KWL platform. Self-publish today at www.kobo.com/writinglife

Dec 21, 2015

For the month of November, a brave team of Kobo staff joined forces to give NaNoWriMo a shot. We blogged about our efforts throughout the month, then several of us (Mark, Christine, Bessie, Sophie, and Wendy) sat down to chat about our experience. Listen to this week's episode to hear our roundtable discussion about how Team KoBoWriMo fared in 2015.

  • How many of us “won” by writing 50k words in 30 days?
  • What are we writing about? Everything from epic fantasy, to a horror novel about an abandoned hippie commune, a thriller about a bitter author, race car driving, and an animal migration.
  • Why did we take on this crazy challenge?
  • What worked for us, and what didn’t? Wendy did all of her writing within GoogleDocs, so she could write on any device throughout her day, especially during her commute. Mark gave dictation a try, so he could write as he drove (!) to work.
  • Dealing with avoiding cross-contamination when a book with a similar subject or approach is published while you’re still writing yours. Sophie’s book has parallels with Andre Alexis’s FIFTEEN DOGS.
  • Would we do it again?
  • Our goals as writers, and with these projects specifically. We represent a broad range of perspectives. Wendy is keeping her work very private, especially in its current, raw state. Bessie is motivated by public/social media feedback.

Kobo Writing Life is a proud sponsor of NaNoWriMo. We love that it inspires writers of all levels to try to sit down and write, set word count goals, and prioritize making creativity a part of your everyday life.

As we reach the end of the year, we want to take the time to thank all of you so much for tuning in to the KWL podcast. It's given us the opportunity to interview amazing authors and service providers, and share their stories with you. We love hearing your feedback. If there is a topic you'd like us to cover or writer you'd like us to interview next year, let us know in the comments or email writinglife@kobo.com