Pens to Paper and Fingers to Keys: It’s Time for NaNoWriMo 2019!

National Novel Writing Month—abbreviated NaNoWriMo—starts today! For those of you who don’t know, NaNoWriMo is an annual internet-based writing challenge that takes place every November. The challenge? Write a 50,000 word first draft of a book…in 30 days. Don’t worry, it only sounds impossible.

NaNoWriMo is a time for writers to throw aside doubt, fear, and possibly a bit of sleep to write 1,667 words (or more!) a day. It can be stressful and hectic, but is also deeply rewarding when you look back at what you’ve accomplished.

I’ve taken part in (and successfully “won”) NaNoWriMo for the past two years. During the brainstorming and outlining of my stories, several books inspired me. Here are some of them!

NaNoWriMo 2017:

In 2017, I wrote a YA fantasy novel called A Pocket of Hope (working title). It’s about a 17-year-old girl named Adaline “Addy” Minett who discovers that her life in a normal Northwestern college town isn’t quite what it seems. In fact, she lives in a pocket world created by her absent mother to keep her safe from her grandfather, who has been trying to kill her and her family since she was born.

The Faerie Path by Allen Frewin Jones

Plot: Anita, an ordinary sixteen-year-old girl, is transported from modern-day London to the realm of Faerie where she discovers that she is Princess Tania, the long-lost daughter of King Oberon and Queen Titania.

How It Inspired Me: I read this book over and over when I was a teenager. And, while I may not have written fairies into my novel, the idea of finding out that you belong to a different, fantastical world greatly influenced it.

Inkheart by Cornelia Funke

Plot: Twelve-year-old Meggie learns that her father Mo, a bookbinder, can "read" fictional characters to life when an evil ruler named Capricorn, freed from the novel "Inkheart" years earlier, tries to force Mo to release an immortal monster from the story.

How It Inspired Me: Addy’s got a love of reading, a missing mom, and a sudden discovery of a different world, all things she shares with Meggie. The magic in my world may work differently, but the idea of discovering a new world and all the magic that comes with it was inspired by this book.

Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling

Plot: Rescued from the outrageous neglect of his aunt and uncle, a young boy with a great destiny proves his worth while attending Hogwarts School for Wizards and Witches.

How It Inspired Me: Magic, intrigue, a mysterious villain who has been after the main character since they were a baby? So many influences.

NaNoWriMo 2018

Last year, I moved away from fantasy wrote a book called Girls, Assassins, and Other Things That Nearly Killed Me – I pitch it as a “queer teen spy romance.” It’s about two girls in training for rival spy agencies that get paired up in a new cooperative training program and end up saving the world. Meanwhile, these same two girls start to fall in love, all while they try to keep the fact that they’re spies from each other.

I’d Tell You I Love You But Then I’d Have to Kill You by Ally Carter

Plot: As a sophomore at a secret spy school and the daughter of a former CIA operative, Cammie is sheltered from "normal teenage life" until she meets a local boy while on a class surveillance mission.

How It Inspired Me: I’m going to just state the obvious and say this book inspired the whole “teenage spies,” although for my characters it’s more of an after-school job.

Six Days of the Condor by James Grady

Plot: A branch of the CIA had been hit and wiped out. Malcom, the only survivor, knew that the order had come from within the Agency itself.

How It Inspired Me: Despite the title, my book doesn’t have a lot of death in it. But they idea of needing to carefully investigate the organization you work for because something dangerous is going to happen greatly influenced my story.

Have you ever participated in NaNoWriMo? What books inspired you?