Some people start from scratch, some people continue a novel in progress. One of the main characters in my Nano story is dead so I had to figure out how he gets killed in the first place before I can start, hence the background history piece.

This really does sound like you work in a government office; the detail – especially reception — sounds frighteningly autobiographical. No shilly-shallying, please! I’ve got my EYE on you. Of course, in this place, it could be in a jar…

It’s a bit rough but Nano likes it rough. All half formed sentences and hanging plot threads.

Don’t give up on Nano, it could be the single most important brain experiment you ever perform on yourself.

For one month you get a little glimpse of what it would feel like to be a real, honest to goodness writer. Everyday 2000 words, no fucking about, no procrastinating, no watching Eastenders or Xbox or the next day you’ll have to write 4000. Nano is not about the quality its about the participation. Can you write 50,000 words in 30 days and keep a story going. Yes you can, its possible. When you get to the end of it and look back the sense of achievement is immense. You’ll know deep down that you can do it, even if its a pile of crap and lets face it 50000 decent words in 30 days is asking a lot. It still doesn’t matter. You’ll have done it and somewhere around 30 or 40,000 words something changes in your brainhole and if you are still enjoying it after that you have yourself a problem, you might be a writer. That’s when you can start in on the whiskey and self pity.

So I say give it another go, I crashed out on my first attempt at 10,000 words but last year I succeeded at the 50,000 and although the damn thing has sat on my hard drive untouched for 11 months, its mine and I did it and I’m bloody going back for more punishment in November because you won’t ever get anywhere with the scribbling unless you are prepared to subject your brainmeat to a bit of the old ultraviolence.

I’ll look forward to the rest, then. NaNoWriMo, eh?

I stumbled foolhardily into the NaNoWriMo thing last year, full of hope and grand plans, entirely without a story, and with no idea what 2000-words-a-day would do to my poor fractured mind. You can imagine the result: it resides in the darkest corner of my computer now, festering away, a watery scab of a story begging to be picked at. Can a scab drizzle? I think so.

I’ll give it a miss this year I think.

Them Archaeologists are too clever by half and yes Sarah it’s true I spent many years ensconced deep in the bowels local government working as a peon for Dublin Corporation. There we would fantasize of one day drinking in the rarified atmosphere of a peon in the Irish Civil Service. They had better pay and more holidays.