So, my attempt to write a 50,000-word novel in 30 days did not meet with a large degree of success. I got off to a good start, but soon ran into three main problems. First, I quickly realized that the story I'd decided to write was going to run to a lot more than 50,000 words and couldn't conveniently be truncated without losing much of what I wanted to achieve. Second, having already run myself into the ground in October, I came down with a bad flu about four days into November (my body's way of telling me, emphatically, that if I won't get some rest of my own free will, it'll make me do it). Third, once I was back on my feet, I still had to decide whether to butcher the story I was working on to bring it down to a more manageable size, or start a new one, and I was way behind schedule on my word count. It wasn't an insurmountable obstacle (I've written 20,000 words over the course of a weekend before); it was just a chore when I was feeling unenthusiastic about the whole project and had lots of other things to catch up on as well. At that point, I decided that there wasn't anything to be gained by sticking to the deadline; I had nothing to prove, no publisher breathing down my neck, and no expectant readers to satisfy, so there was no point in wearing myself out writing if I wasn't enjoying it.

So, I'm still working on the novel, just at a more sustainable pace. It'll get finished (though not until well into next year, at this rate), and will no doubt be much better for not having been rushed through on a wave of caffeine and resentment.