I have a general NaNo question--this is my second year participating in NaNo and last year, i got a measly 18-pages into my novel. Is it "cheating" if I work off of the same novel for this year?

Purists will insist that you start with a fresh novel... but I am not a purist :-)

NaNo is a great motivational resource for completing a novel or other writing projects. I think it is fine to use it to complete a novel you have in progress so long as you count in your NaNo 2018 wordcount only those words written in November this year.

--Tim

Don't consider it cheating. There are many Nano Rebels among us, including myself, who will be using the energy of several hundred thousand writers world-wide and the numerous writing events planned inour region to continue work on an existing novel.

I'm not a purist, so I say go for it. In my other region, we have a #rewritesquad of people who have decided to dust off their very first attempts at a novel, rip them to shreds, and rebuild them from the ground up. In my opinion, NaNoWriMo is more about developing a habit of writing daily and connecting with your writing community than anything else. Do that, write 50k, and you're a winner. Heck, do that and fall short of 50k, and you still win. You just don't get the fancy "winner" tag and goodies.

I'm working on my novel. The same one i started in 2016...came back to in 2017...and STILL working on for this year! IT'S NEVER GUNNA GET FINISHED UGH BUT...i think the point of nano is just to write. period. to get yourself writing. no matter how, no matter what with...just write...and maybe all that writing will inspire you to keep writing the rest of the year (hahahahaah *snort* yeah right)