There are only a couple more days until NaNoWriMo kicks off. All the hard work writers have being doing in October will be put into use as they pound out their novels during November. As this is the last post in the NaNoPrep blog series, I thought that today is the perfect time to share some last minute tips and tricks that I have found useful in my NaNoWriMo experience and that hopefully you’ll find helpful too.

Forget About Perfection: I’ve mentioned this idea several times recently, but it really is worth mentioning again. This is one of the most important things to remember as you start your novels this weekend. Your book is not going to come out perfectly, and you simply don’t have the time to edit your first page over and over again. NaNoWriMo is all about getting a rough draft down. So resist the urge to edit and press on. You can fix it in December.

Always Hit Your Word Count: Always hit your daily word count, and if you can, press on and write a little more. Some days, life will get in the way and you might not always make it to the goal. But on days you can, hit that target. Even if you’re ahead on your words, always hit the minimum 1,667 words a day. If you build up a bank of extra words and get into the habit of writing the same amount every day, you’re less likely to fall behind if you have to take a day off.

Look After Yourself: This is really important, and should come before all writing advice really. NaNoWriMo is not a sprint. It’s a marathon. It’s 30 days of gruelling work. You need to take care of yourself if you want to make it to the end alive. Make sure you get enough sleep. Take breaks while you’re writing to rest your brain and your hands. Taking care of your hands is super important. There is nothing worse than hurting your hands or wrists in the middle of NaNoWriMo and not being able to type.

Have Fun: Guys, this is what NaNoWriMo is about. Whether you’re ahead, whether you’re behind, whether the words are coming easily, or you’ve hit a mental block, have fun with it. There’s no point in doing this if you’re not going to enjoy it.

This might be the end of NaNoPrep, but there’s plenty more exciting things happening in November. We’re lucky enough to have three guest posters sharing their experiences of NaNoWriMo, and giving their best tips on how to stay motivated about your writing and make it through the next month. I’m sure they’d be thrilled if you stopped by to read their posts.

Are you prepared for NaNoWriMo? Excited? Scared? Have you done it before? Are you looking forward to meeting the guest posters?

We’re down to the last few days before NaNoWriMo. By now everyone should be reaching the end of their plotting and planning. Hopefully you’re all getting excited for the start of NaNoWriMo. I know I am. There are always so many things to prepare, and today I want to address one of the most important things. Your mind-set. Having the right attitude about your writing is most important to success. If you don’t think right, you’re more likely to be demotivated and give up on the whole endeavour. Many things have been said on the subject by much better writers than I, so today they’ll be helping me explain some truths about writing.

Half the battle is turning up for your writing session, even if you don’t feel motivated, even if you don’t feel inspired. Nothing gets written if you don’t sit down to start. To win, you need to plant yourself in a chair and just write.

The whole point of NaNo is to get a draft of a book written. It doesn’t have to be good. It’s not going to be good. But it’s going to be written, and that’s the whole point. So don’t agonise over the wording now. Smash the book onto the page and pick up the pieces later in editing.


The sad truth is that inspiration doesn’t always turn up when you need it most. Even if inspiration is missing, write anyway. You can’t afford not to write if you want to finish your book, and it’ll most likely turn up when you’re already writing anyway.


This is one of the important things about NaNoWriMo. At this time, more than ever, writing is exploration. Ideas will turn up that you might never have considered before. Half the fun is seeing where the book ends up going.

What is your favourite quote about writing? Are you getting excited for NaNoWriMo? Tomorrow is our last day of NaNoPrep. Are you ready for NaNo?

NaNoWriMo is made up of a weird combination of days of intense inspiration and days of no motivation. Some days the book seems to write itself. And some days…it doesn’t. But, inspired or not, writers need to write every single day of November in order to win. The question is, how do you soldier on when motivation is gone? How do you keep writing instead of hiding under the blankets and eating chocolate?

Be Aware: The first step to overcoming these days of low motivation is to realise that they are going to happen, regardless. You’re not going to feel like writing every single day. But you can plan ahead of time so you have some strategies to help you through those bad days when they arise.

Find Your Support Group: Find yourself some other people doing NaNo and stay in contact with them during the month. You can do it on Facebook, on the NaNoWriMo forums, or on blogs. It’s so much more fun to do NaNo with a group of people, and on those days when you don’t feel motivated you’ll have a cheer squad to spur you on.

Utilize Word Wars: What is a word war? It’s a race with other writers to see who can write the most amount of words in a certain amount of times. The prize? A pile of words added to your novel. You’d be surprised at how quickly you can write when you’re competing against other writers. This is another thing your support group can help with.

Write or Die: Not literally. There’s an online program call Write or Die, which is like an online word processer. Except it eats your words if you stop writing. It’s like a word war, only instead of racing against friends, you’re racing to keep the computer from deleting all your hard work. Don’t like the idea of losing your words? You can choose other consequences instead. It can be great for forcing yourself to write through a mental block.

Rewards: Give yourself a reward for writing a certain amount of words. If you write x amount of words, give yourself five minutes on Facebook or Pinterest. Or eat some chocolate. Or watch a video on YouTube. Little rewards can be so motivating and can give you just the boost you need to get through a rough patch in your writing.

How do you stay motivated when you don’t feel particularly inspired? What’s your best tip for a good writing day?

Have you visited Gossiping with Dragons on Facebook yet? There’s plenty more motivating and inspiring things over there.

There are lots of things one can do when preparing for NaNoWriMo. During October, writers everywhere get busy plotting, world building, getting to know their characters, and preparing their books as much as possible before the craziness begins in November. But if there’s one thing I don’t seen people talk about very often when they discuss NaNoWriMo preparations is preparing your writing time. And to me this is one of the most important things you can do.

Making sure you have time to write is key to NaNoWriMo success. If you don’t have time in the day to write, then you’re never going to hit your daily word count. It’s a fact. But there may be more times in a day to write than you might originally think. Take a look at what you do in day. Are there times you’re not busy in or that you can repurpose from another activity? Is there a time that you can make your regular writing time for the month? If you can’t make a big block of time available, try finding several short blocks of time for writing sessions.

In an ideal world, your writing time would be during your most productive time of day. Realistically though, that’s not always going to happen. My most productive time of day is midmorning, but I rarely have time to write before the evening. Work with whatever time you have available. And be prepared to make sacrifices to find that writing time. You may need to give up time for reading, watching TV, or even get up a little earlier if that’s what it takes.

Don’t discount those odd five or ten minutes you might find during your day either. It might not be long enough to get very many words written, but any words you get written are words you don’t’ have to write later. Write on your phone while on the train, or waiting at an appointment. Write something while the dinner’s cooking. Even if you can’t find a big block of free time during the day, making the most of what time you have will help you get well on your way to victory.

NaNoWriMo is a tough month. It requires sacrifice and hard work. But it is so worth it at the end when you’re staring at that book you wrote. Be prepared to write at odd times, and work out where you can make time for writing now so that when November rolls around, you’ll be ahead of the game and ready to rock that word count.

What time do you like to write in? What’s the oddest place you’ve ever written in? Any tips to finding time to write in?

Characters. Without them, there would be no books. Even the most epic of storylines isn’t going to rivet readers without a diverse cast of well written people to carry it through. So it makes sense that you would want to work out at least something about your characters before you start writing your book. That’s not to say you have to know every single detail about them before you start. In fact, you might prefer to discover their personalities as you write. But it is a good idea to work out at least a couple of basic things before you get started.

The least you need to know about your characters is their names and approximate ages. You may also like to work out what their profession is. This should give you enough information to start off with. It is also a good idea to brainstorm a list of possible names for other characters who might turn up along the way as well, especially if you prefer not to call every single character John or Mary.

If you feel like doing more work to get to know your characters, then there’s plenty you can do. You could fill out a character questionnaire. There are plenty of good ones online that will help give a fairly rounded view of a character’s life. I’ve included a couple in my resource list down below. You could also find a picture that represents your character, or even draw one if you’re artistically talented. If you like to work your characters out beforehand, go crazy. It’ll only help your book in the end. However, in all your character planning, remember that your characters may change and grow in ways that you didn’t expect at the beginning.

There are plenty of amazing resources on the internet that are perfect for helping build characters. Below I’ve listed just a few that I find help me. Hopefully some of them will help you too:

Character name and personality generator: This is a really great generator if you want a character in a hurry. It gives you everything from name and personality to potential jobs as well. Also good for inspiration for character traits.

Detailed character chart: If you want to put a bit of work into getting to know your characters then you might find this character chart useful. It’s very detailed and is useful in helping you get to know all sides of your character.

Simpler character chart: If you’d like to fill out a questionnaire for your character, but you don’t want to answer too many questions then you might find this chart useful. It’s less detailed than the last one, but it still covers all the most important details.

Elizabeth Lewis’ Pinterest: There are some really cool boards on this account that are perfect for character inspiration. I would especially recommend the ‘Souls’ board. It has a vast range of pictures that are perfect for character reference.

Vasilia’s Character Pinterest: This Pinterest account is the ultimate place to find character reference pictures. There are heaps of boards dedicated solely to pictures for characters, and they’re all split up by hair colour, gender, and other such details. If you’re looking for a picture for a specific character, definitely check these boards out.

Behind the Name: This website has a great random generator that is perfect for helping find names for characters. You can generate names from specific countries, or even from mythology. It’s the best name generator I’ve found so far.

How much do you like to know about your characters before you start writing? Do you like to know everything? Or do you prefer to get to know them as you go?

One thing that is often overlooked while preparing for NaNoWriMo is world building. It is easy to forget about planning your world as well as your plot. But there is nothing worse when you’re in the flow of writing, than being pulled out of your book to work out what a town is called. That’s not to say that you have to draw up an incredibly detailed map that shows every little village and patch of trees. But taking some time to work out some of the characteristics of your world can save a lot of headaches later on.

The least you need to know before you start writing is where your story is set. If you’re creating a world or a town, give it a name. If you invent a capital city, give that a name too. Name any other major landmarks you know of. Make a list of the places you have named and give them each a short description so you can easily identify them later. When you’re in the middle of writing, you don’t want to have to go scrolling back through your novel looking for the name of a small town that got five sentences of screen time. The added bonus to making this list is that you can keep adding to it as you add more settings while you’re writing.

If, like me, you don’t like to go in for heavy world building at the start, or you don’t have time to work out much about your world, then on top of working out these basic details, also take a few minutes to brainstorm a list of place names. With this list on hand, any place can be named in a matter of seconds while you’re writing, which means you won’t have to struggle to think up a name in the middle of a scene.

If you do have time for world building, or world building is your forte, then there’s lots you can do to prepare. Think about the main settings. Write a description of each place. What are the people like? What is their main trade? How important a place is it? What are the important buildings? Where do people spend their time? What are the surrounding towns or countries? Try summing each place up in one sentence. A word of warning though. World building can end up being quite addictive. Make sure that you’re not doing more planning of your world than you are of your book. It’ll do you no good to start NaNoWriMo with an incredibly detailed world and no idea of the plot.

Whether you like world building or not, making a few preparations now saves a whole lot of time later on. And when you’re in the middle of NaNoWriMo trying to hit a world count, the easier you’ve made it for yourself, the easier your month will be. As an added bit of help, here are a few resources I have discovered, which you might find useful when building your worlds:

Springhole Generators: This website has whole lot of random generators that are great for country and town names. It’s also a big help when you need to brainstorm a list crazy objects for quests, or generate a random race or setting.

Fantasy world building questions: This website has a whole list of amazingly though provoking questions for world building. It’s an especially good resource if you want to do some in depth thinking about your setting.

Seventh Sanctum generators: This is another website with some useful random generators that are very useful for quick world building ideas. Just looking through some of the generated suggestions can spark ideas sometimes.

Tumblr blog with nature photos: Need some picture inspiration for your world building? This Tumblr is filled with amazing photos of places. It might be useful for helping inspire new places for your book.

Pinterest boards: Among other incredible boards, this Pinterest account has some amazing boards dedicated to settings of all types. Perfect for inspiring world building ideas.

Do you like to world build? What are your best world building tips? Got any good resources to share?

Outlining is one of the big things people ask questions about every year. Should you outline your novel? And if so, how much outlining should you do? It’s a valid question. NaNoWriMo is all about being spontaneous. It’s about starting with nothing and ending up with a novel. Some people believe that it’s best to just start with a vague idea and run with it. And that’s fine. But unless that is how you normally write, then if you want a novel that has potential instead of being just a pile of words, then relying on inspiration alone is probably not the greatest idea.

NaNoWriMo is an intense challenge. You have to hit a minimum word count every day if you want to win. The word count graph doesn’t care whether you have the flu, stayed up to two in the morning writing assignments, or that your muse didn’t turn up to work today. The fact is, you have to write those 1,667 words every day, no matter what. And inspiration isn’t going to hit every single day. This means that there’s a high chance that your book will come to a grinding halt. That’s where outlining helps. Even a little planning can make a huge difference once NaNoWriMo starts.

Outlining for Pantsers

Pantsers, I know that the very thought of writing an outline with neat little scene and chapter divisions fills you with fear. You’re about the creative flow and letting the characters take over. So writing up a detailed outline isn’t really going to help you at all. Instead, write a short synopsis of your book. It doesn’t have to be more than five or six sentences long. All it has to do is give a broad overview of the basic plot to give you a road map when you start writing. It gives you a bit of direction, while still leaving plenty room for creative improvisation. (The second step of the Snowflake Method is really helpful for writing that synopsis.)

Outlining for Plotters

Plotters, you know your method of outlining better than I do. Plan your book so that you’re sure you know enough to get started writing it. Make sure you’re comfortable with your outline before NaNoWriMo starts. Once you start writing, there won’t be any time for extra outlining. But don’t get too attached to your plan. The craziest, best ideas can pop up during NaNoWriMo. But they can completely change the direction of your book. Be ready to let go of your outline if something amazing comes up. Spontaneous ideas are often some of the best ones.

Are you a plotter or a pantser? What are your best NaNoWriMo tips? Know someone who is doing NaNo? Share this blog series with them!
Have you checked out Gossiping with Dragons on Facebook yet? There’s plenty more writing help and fun on the Facebook page. I’d love to see you there!

It’s nearly November folks, which means that it’s nearly NaNoWriMo time. At this point, writers are scrambling to get ready to start writing on the 1st of November. (Not sure what NaNoWriMo is? Check out my post on it here). Sometimes it can be overwhelming trying to decide what to prepare before the big day. Do you need a full plot outline? What equipment will you need? Well, I'm very excited to announce that over the course of the next two weeks, I'm going to be running a blog series designed to help you get ready for NaNoWriMo, and which hopefully will answer some of the most pressing questions.


I’ve been doing NaNoWriMo and Camp NaNoWriMo every year since 2011 and, while I am by no means an expert, I have picked up a few tips that help me get to the end. Every year I see people give up in the first few days because they didn’t realise how hard it was, or because they simply weren’t prepared. I learnt the hard way that preparation is key to making your month as easy and productive as possible, even if that preparation is only understanding exactly what you’re going to be facing. Hopefully this blog series will leave you a little more equipped to face the challenge.


Of course, not everyone will be doing NaNo this November. And I totally understand that. However, I hope you’ll still stick around, even if you’re not doing it, because many of the tips I’ll be sharing work really well for every day writing as well. So to everyone, welcome to NaNoPrep, the blog series designed to help you make the most of your month of writing.


Also, last week I was tagged by Heather from Sometimes I’m a Story for the Watch Me Write challenge. Basically I needed to record myself writing and then turn that into a video so people can see what I’m like when I write. In this video I write and edit a piece of flash fiction. I'll leave it down below in case you're interested in reading the whole thing. Please note that it is not what I would call 'finished'. There's plenty more editing needing doing I know, but it'll do for an example. (See the picture that inspired it here. Music from here. If the quality is too bad, watch it on YouTube. The quality is slightly better.)

There’s no moon tonight. He relies on the wavering light of his torch as he picks his way up the side of the hill. Grandpa says tonight is the night, that the sky is going to put on a show. By rights he shouldn’t really be here. There’s school tomorrow, and the wind is bitterly cold. But the siren call of the stars brought him out into the night.

At the top of the hill, he turns off his light and settles down, wrapping his arms around his knees to keep himself warm. Overhead, the stars stare down, silent and still. He waits, patient, silent as they are. Grandpa said to come, and Grandpa knows. He watched this same sight, oh, a lifetime ago.

The first star falls, streaking across the sky, trailing a fiery tail behind it that slowly fades away. Another star follows it, and then a third. Now all the stars are falling in a shining cascade. Together, they shoot across the sky, vanishing over the horizon. His mouth hangs open as he watches the stars fly away in bursts of light. He will never forget this night.

Maybe one day, he’ll tell his own grandchildren of the night he sat on that hill, staring up at the sky. He’ll tell them of the star’s fiery tails, the shimmer and shine as they flew away. And his heart might swell with the same wonder and awe that he felt on that night. The night when the stars fell.

If you enjoyed this, then I challenge you to have a go. Record yourself writing something and leave me a link in the comments so I can see it


What are your best tips for NaNoWriMo? Leave them in a comment below. How many times have you done NaNoWriMo? Have you made a Watch Me Write video? Leave me a link!