Well, October has flown by and November is arriving. This means several things: Election Day (go vote!), tailgating, Thanksgiving, crunch time for bringing grades up, and NaNoWriMo.

"What is NaNoWriMo?" you may ask. NaNoWriMo is an acronym that stands for Nation Novel Writing Month, and that month is here. Every November thousands of participants from all over the world work extremely hard to write a full novel in just 30 days. The challenge is to write 50,000 words in one month-starting on November 1st and finishing on November 30th.

There are events and meetups held for those participating in NaNoWriMo to collaborate and inspire each other. In addition, writers can use the official NaNoWriMo website to track their progress, chat with other participants online, find inspiration and motivation, and much more.

After writing your novel, you can look into getting it published. In fact, a good number of NaNoWriMo participants go on to publish their 30-day novels after the month ends. Some popular NaNoWriMo books include by TheNight Circus by Erin Morgenstern, Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell, Losing Faith by Denise Jaden, Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen, and the list goes on.

The challenge serves as an incitement to get writers to write every day rather than waiting for inspiration to come to them.

Personally, I've wanted to write a book for quite some time so I have decided to participate in NaNoWriMo this year! Whether or not I'll actually get the 50,000 words in just 30 days with school and extracurricular activities, etc. is a toss-up. Even if I don't manage it in the 30 days, I mainly want to use the month to actually start writing.

If you're anything like me and have always wanted to write, this is the perfect opportunity to get started and meet others who can motivate you.

Good luck, NaNoWriMo participants!