I first heard about NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) two years ago when a friend took part in it. I heard about it because he bitched about it constantly, it seems to be one of those things you immediately regret agreeing to take part in. That's fine though, I agree to do things and then hate myself for doing so on an almost hourly basis. I'm used to the self-loathing.

The NaNoWriMo challenge lasts for the month of November and you basically have to write a novel, 50,000 words to be precise, in 30 days.

It's like a marathon, but you don't get any fitter. In fact, you'll probably gain a few pounds whilst attacking the custard creams in the early hours of the morning desperately trying to figure out where the hell you're going with chapter six.

I've never taken part in NaNoWriMo and I definitely don't have time to do it this year, which obviously means I've signed up anyway. I don't really get to write fiction any more and I do miss it, so I'm looking forward to the creative challenge. I'm not expecting to review my 'novel' on the 1st of December and be happy with what I've written, but I know I'll enjoy the process of writing it.

I've never really tried to write fiction in the form of a novel, whenever I've had half decent ideas I've always developed them as screenplays. I'm excited to try my hand at a different style of writing and it will be a change to rely on my descriptive powers rather than cinematography to tell a story. I wanted to cheat and take one of my old screenplay concepts to use as the starting point for my NaNoWriMo plot, but the whole point of NaNoWriMo is to develop an idea from scratch and to go from concept to 50,000 words in 30 days. 

So what to write about?

I stayed at my grandparents new house last weekend and it was the first time I'd seen it since they moved in. They have a gate that leads to nowhere in their back garden and I knew as soon as I saw it that I wanted to write *something* about where that gate could lead to. I hadn't even thought of taking part in NaNoWriMo last weekend but I took a picture of it anyway to capture the moment.

I suppose my story will be along the lines of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, The Labyrinth, The Secret Garden, Alice in Wonderland, Coraline, Pan's Labyrinth and the like. Whether it's a wardrobe, rabbit hole or tiny door - all these stories focus on a gateway to another world. Essentially, my main character (a boy, name to be determined) will discover a palace beyond the gate and a dark and twisted array of characters. The palace will be loosely based on my trip last weekend to Ickworth House, as in reality this is what lies beyond my grandparents' gate. 

Without wanting to sound like a pretentious arse, I know that I'm at 'my creative best' when writing very dark horror material. But I don't want to do that for NaNoWriMo, it's not something I like to indulge as it messes with my head a bit. I don't really want people to read the horror plots that I play with in my mind, on the few times that I have been honest with people about my ideas in that genre I've always been made to feel like I should be sectioned, which isn't great (though perhaps fair).

My untitled novel will be aimed at children, slightly scary but majestic too. One thing I do know is that there'll be lots of butterflies in jars and a giant talking gerbil who wears a waistcoast.

I'll probably write updates on here ever so often when I should actually be working on the novel itself, but hopefully I'll get to 50,000 words by the 30th of November.

Why don't you sign up too? Then we can regret our decision together :)