NaNoWriMo 2024 Ayshim, 1 November 202424 January 2025 I am writing… The book I’m writing this year is nonfiction. I have put a lot of hours into researching it. That means I talked to a lot romance scammers–mostly from Nigeria–from my own fake accounts. The result… Well, that will be the whole book or more than one book if it gets too big. I haven’t decided on that yet. Every day, I will show up with my word count for the day and give you a small update on how my writing is going. Day 1I spent most of the day writing the intro and basic information about romance scams. The rest of the day was more about restructuring the book and planning the next day.Word count: 3333 Day 2Today I worked on military romance scams, wrote the intro to this type of scams, tidied up conversations I’ve had with scammers who were posing as military personnel and added chapter specific red flags.Today’s word count: 3232Total words written: 6565Photo below is a scene from my desk. That framed ‘friends’ photo is a gift from my soul sister, a fellow scam fighter and an incredible human-being. I’ve had the privilege to meet her face-to-face in the UK this year. I will forever cherish those memories and I hope one day the world will appreciate her efforts of keeping the world scam-free. Word count for the day: 3232Total words written: 6565 Day 3I’m almost halfway through 50,000 word bench already but adding my word count slowly to NaNoWriMo website because a huge chunk of those chapters will be edited and that will leave me with less written words. Tomorrow I will have reached 10,000 words though and that means I will earn yet another badge on top of all the other ones I’ve already earned.Let’s have a look at todays numbers:Word count for the day: 3022Total words written: 9587 Day 4I’ve spent most of the day tidying up a very long conversation I had with one particular scammer from Nigeria who was incredibly annoying since I pushed all his buttons and pinpointed his lies. It was 35 pages of text but I managed to reduce it down to 16 pages in the end. Additionally, I’ve taken more notes on victim profiles and how they feel after being scammed. Let’s check out the numbers for today before I go and pick up our washing and decide what I’m cooking for tonight: Word count for the day: 4444Total words written: 14,031 NaNoWriMo Day 5It’s incredibly common for romance scammers to use stolen photos of innocent people but…Some of those scammers sometimes use their own faces. You might think that they’re being truthful but in the end, the purpose is the same. They still want something from you. It could be a visa to come to your country or some money to help with feeding their family. It’s still not right regardless of their initial purpose they present earlier on. Well, today I wrote about one of those scam stories using their own faces. It was so clear that he was talking to someone with a hidden agenda. He just didn’t know that he was talking to a scam-baiter. Now I’m going to head down to my kitchen and make some asparagus pastry. They’re in season at the moment and I managed to get some really young ones. Not imported from Peru or Mexico. I’ll wrap them up in blankets with pesto and parmesan then I’ll bake them. To go with this awesomeness (a word I picked up from scammers along the way), I’ll make pepperonata. My style; not Sicilian or anything. I make it may way. Before I go and create wonderful dishes in the kitchen, I’d like to add my word count for today… Words written today: 4332Total words written: 18363I’m getting there, Peoples 🙂 Day 6 and I’ve reached 23645 words. Almost halfway there. I had to laugh at one of those fake doctors whom I talked to while I was doing my research for this book. He told me that his wife died of prostate cancer 🤣 He didn’t even know how to spell prostate cancer; it was ‘prostrate cancer’ 🤣 Thank God, some of them are too ignorant and not so good at getting their story right. Day 7… and I had a lovely surprise today. I surprised myself, to be precise. I was bracing myself to deal with a large volume of transcripts after I got back from the gym today.This particular account is a tricky one because I talked to this Nigerian scammer twice from my own fake accounts and twice from his fake accounts. But to my surprise, I didn’t have to do anything! I must have done all the tidying up and putting transcripts into very handsome order some time ago. I just forgot, didn’t I? Well, that was the end of book chapter about scammers who use their own faces to scam people.And my word count for today is 4766 and the total word count is… 28,411! Today, I’ve passed the halfway mark and treated myself with listening some beautiful jazz by Salena Jones. I also hung her Aylesbury concert ad on my wall (photo below). I learnt how how to sing jazz by listening to her cassette tapes and immitating her. Named my very first dog after one of the songs in one particular cassette tape. Jesse, that is. She is one true artist and I got to meet her in the UK this year and told her what her singing still means to me after all those years. She still rocks, by the way 🙂 Day 8I have just started a new chapter about pig butchering (investment frauds combined with romance scams. After I finished reading a book I started on Monday, I sat down and tidied up a conversation I had with a scammer who was into pig butchering. Reading it all over again made me sick because I talked to this scammer from my private Instagram account as well, not knowing that he was a scammer. Today was also my washing day and I had to a little bit cleaning as well. I’m exhausted now. Heat doesn’t help, either but I suppose I can relax now until dinner time. Today’s word count: 3355Total words written: 31,766 Yes, I’m getting there! Day 9Today I continued working on one and only pig butchering example I have for the book and now it’s completed. Today’s word count: 4322Total words written: 36,088 Day 10I tried to sleep in this morning, being Sunday and all but Little Missy wouldn’t let me sleep as if that 4AM nature call wasn’t enough. Anyway, I am now working on engineer scams and tidying up 2 transcripts of the most annoying romance scammer I’ve ever had the pleasure talking to (sarcasm alert!). It was such a pleasure to finally get his account deleted in the end. And my total word count passed 40,000 YAY! 😊 Today’s word count: 4702Total words written: 40,790 Day 11 … and I’ve almost reached 50000 word count. Very tired, though. Here’s today’s numbers: Words written today: 4768Total words written: 45,558 Day 12 I did it!For the 9th time! I actually thought this was my 8th year doing this but NaNoWriMo knows these things better than me by the looks of things. This doesn’t mean that I will stop writing though. Today, I’ve moved on ‘offshore workers’ section of the book and I will be adding my daily word count every single day until the competition is over. Now… Today’s word count: 4833Total words written: 50,391 NaNoWriMo Day 13I may have won the competition, but the book is still going. I still have a lot to add to it. I have just finished a conversation I had with an engineer who claimed to be working at an oil rig in Irish Sea. I talked to him twice and he was also incredibly annoying. He never answered any of my questions and always dished up some pathetic excuses and lies. Before I reported his account (he was using Sergio Alberti’s photos), he removed his profile photo. Then changed it to semi-visible photo of a man with a beard. Eventually, I got him through ‘harassment’ complaint. Certain accounts need different methods to kill and this one was one of them. Anyway, let’s talk about numbers, baby! Today’s word count: 4777Total words written: 55,168 Day 14I must admit, I hate those scammers who try to lure you away from the platform where they found you. If you accept, then you have some messy chats to tidy up later. This is exactly what I worked on. And this guy was one of those sticky, slimy romance scammers I’ve ever had the (dis)pleasure to talk to. Anyways, here’s the word count for today:Today’s word count: 3388Total words written: 58,556 Day 15Halfway through NaNoWriMo but I’m not done yet. I still have a way to go in terms of adding more content to the book and tidying up some conversations to make them easier to read and follow. Gosh those uneducated scammers do not make it easier for me as their responses are all over the place! Still working on one account. Geez! Anyway, today was still a good day. Here’s the numbers of the day:Today’s word count: 4286Total words written: 62,842 Day 16Mostly research organisation today. I didn’t realise I had several folders and Scrivener files for this very topic I’m writing about. Too many duplicates as well. And now for today’s numbers…Words written today: 3845Total words written: 66,687 Day 17Finally finished one of the conversations I had with a solo-working romance scammer from Benin. He admitted that he consulted ‘black magic’ to make his ‘scamming business’ lucrative but I actually don’t see that happening for he was a terrible scammer (luckily!). Anyway, let’s have a look the numbers for today…Today’s word count: 4437Total words written: 71,124 Day 18I’ve had a fragmented day today as I have some other things to focus on but that didn’t affect my word count today.Today’s word count: 3342Total words written: 74466 Day 19I finally downloaded my winner stuff (one of them is in the photo below).I haven’t checked the other winner goodies yet as writing the book keeps me so busy. So does decluttering the whole house. Anyway, here’s today’s numbers:Today’s word count: 2333Total words written: 76,799 Day 20Words written on the day: 3212Yesterday’s total word count: 80,011 Day 21Words written today: 1877Total words written: 81,888… and I won the badge below: Day 22I haven’t written much today because I had other stuff happening. Still, I did write about Nigeria as a country and its capital city: Lagos.I had to refer back to my research I’d done some time ago for something else and hopefully tomorrow I will write about my connection to Lagos. Not just because my own romance scammer turned out to be from Lagos but also I wrote to my beloved Betul Abla for years when she was living in Lagos. Let’s talk about numbers, baby…Today’s word count: 1788Total words written: 83,676 Day 23I have done some segmented writing today. Kind of jumped from one section to the next, filling up spaces with words from my research. I discovered yet another living area in Lagos and finished my writing with these numbers:Today’s word count: 1903Total words written: 85,579 Now, I’m going to get ready to celebrate our wedding anniversary 🙂 Day 24Today was more about cleaning and organising than writing but I had some extra words I put aside for today. So…Today’s word count: 1934Total words written: 87,513 Day 25Today, I worked on my research about The Yahoo Boys, Yahoo Plus and Sakawa Boys. It is always a stomach-turning event to read about these, but it needs to be done.The numbers of the day are:Today’s word count: 2230Total words written: 89,743 Day 26Not long to go but even though the book is getting bigger every day, it may not finish before NaNoWriMo comes to an end. What to do?Today, I worked on The Yahoo Boys, Yahoo Plus and Yahoo Plus Plus. It is yet another despicable side of Nigerian romance scams and it leaves me so broken every time I read my research findings on the subject.I also have had a domestic project happening today: wardrobe cleaning. I took everything out of my wardrobe and wiped all the hangers and reorganised the whole thing with new space-saving hangers. I haven’t quite finished yet but I’m getting there.Now, let’s talk about the numbers…Today’s word count: 2424Total words written: 92,167 Day 27Nigeria, Nigeria, Nigeria. That’s all I have to say even if I sound like Forrest Gump 🙂Anyways, here are the numbers for today and beyond… Today’s word count: 2000Total words written: 94,167 Day 28 & 29I may have missed posting my daily word count yesterday but I’ll fix it today.Day 28Daily word count: 1743Day 29Today’s word count: 2372Total words written so far: 98,282 Day 30 Last day of NaNoWriMo and I finished my first draft like a pro. Pretty exhausted though. Do you want the actual numbers?Number of words written today: 5815 (Yes, I worked really hard today)Total words written during the entire month: 104,097Insert happy dance here 💃 I found one 🙂 It’s time to celebrate now 🍾🥂🍷🍹 books & writing