Writing that breathes.

Any writers reading this may or may not have heard of NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), when crazy people like myself embark on a mission to write a 50,000 word novel during the month of November. People have laughed and called me mad, but I assure you it's possible. I've done it three times and I am determined that this year I'll add another trophy to my fictional shelf. But I'm not here to talk about Nanowrimo, because you may already know what it is, and if you don't, I recommend you head over to nanowrimo.org to get the low down on this crazy yet exhilarating writing activity.

What I'm here to talk about is the character who will finally be getting her own novel this November.

Before I start, I have a couple of confessions to make. Confession number one, I used to be a regular online role player and fanfiction writer (don't ask to see my fanfiction, it's terrible). And secondly, the character I mentioned above was (you guessed it) originally a character created especially for a role play game. As embarrassing as I find it to admit to non-online friends that I used to role play, I've got to be honest, I wouldn't be the writer I am today without it. My first venture into RPing was full of Mary Sues, clichés and cheesy lines. But as I got older and more experienced, my writing improved. Most importantly, I stopped using RP as an opportunity to put myself into my favourite fictional worlds (that gets boring after a while) and started getting creative with characters.

The character in question had similar beginnings. She started off as a baddie, quite generic, a school bully, a spoilt brat. But eventually, I began to discover this character's reasons for being the way she was. Her dreams. Her fears. The things that make her tick. Suddenly, she went from being a generic baddie to a well-fleshed out character. So much so that she breathed on the page. She became so natural to write that she pretty much told ME what she would do in each situation, rather than it being the other way around.

After a while my RPing days began to look over, and I realised that I didn't want my best character to die with the site she had lived on for a number of years. So, six years ago, when I first heard about Nanowrimo, I tried to write her into her own novel. But the RP world was still too fresh, and much to my dismay, she fell flat and dull in the vague and pale world I tried to create just for her.

Six years on, now that the RP sites are well and truly buried, I've worked and reworked that world and the plots to go with it and I'm finally ready to try again. And believe me, I've never been so excited for Nanowrimo. I can't wait to write her and get to know her again. It will be like seeing an old friend after long years of separation.

So, as I wait impatiently for the 1st November, able to do everything except start writing, I'm talking about my novel and my character instead.

It's going to be a good November.

Happy noveling ;)

Norwich, UK, October 2015