We’re halfway through October now, which means that November is getting pretty close now. This also means that one of my favourite events, NaNoWriMo is almost upon us. I discovered this event back in 2011 and I haven’t missed a year since. Today, in honour of this amazing challenge, I’m going to talk about NaNoWriMo and explain what it is, why I love doing it, and why you should think about giving it a try.

What is NaNoWriMo?

National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo, is a month long writing event run during November where crazy writers around the world come together online to write together, fuelled by determination, a love of writing, and way too much coffee. The aim? To have a finished novel, or 50k words of a novel written by the end of the month.

Who can do it?

Anyone. Literally. It’s free, and there’s no age limit on creativeness. For teens and children, there’s a young writer’s program where you get to set your own word goal. For those 13 and up, there’s the full NaNoWriMo, all 50k glorious words of it. I’ve done it. My mum’s done it. My little sister won the Young Writer’s Program for the first time at age 7. Anyone can have a go.

Why do I do it?

NaNoWriMo is one of the biggest writing events ever. There are literally hundreds of thousands of writers writing at the very same time as me, all racing for the same goal, which is amazing. There are pep talks, bucket loads of motivation to write, and pledge to write for an entire month. I simply can’t resist a good challenge like this. NaNoWriMo is an amazing way to get your first draft on the page without worrying about it being perfect. Writing at that speed, your book isn’t going to be perfect. But it will be written.

Why should you do it?

Because it’s the best writing challenge I’ve seen so far. It’ll motivate you to write every day and finish a book. You’ll be writing with people in a social event (you can go solo, but it’s way more fun if you do it with other people). You will be pushed to dedicate yourself to your writing for an entire month. And it will be great for your book. You’ll make so much progress you won’t believe it.

Of course, NaNoWriMo is not for everyone. Some people write better when they work at their own pace. But if you like challenges, if you want to try something new, or you just want to make good progress with your book, you should definitely think about giving this a go.

NaNoWriMo 2014. I’m doing it. Are you?

Have you ever done NaNoWriMo before? Will you be doing it this year? If so, what are you planning on writing? If not, would you ever consider doing something like this?