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Twelve Easy Steps Make a Novel
So, you’ve always wanted to write a novel.
Or maybe you’ve got to write a novel fast to meet a deadline.
Novice or beginner, you are faced with where, how? The following
steps are a guideline.
1) Set aside a time and place
to write. If possible, the same number of hours and the same
time every day, so that writing becomes a habit.
2) Gathering. Choose a story
idea that will allow you to do the following:
A) Write what you know and
who you are.
B) Harvest your life. Write
the kind of story can you tell best. What do you have to
say? What issues do you feel passionate about?
C) Carry index cards. When
an idea pops into your mind, write it down.
D) Journal or write morning
pages. I sometimes get up and write three or four pages
in the morning on whatever I feel like with the purpose
of directing my thoughts toward my work in progress. Usually,
I get something about my present story that is pretty good
and pretty deep that way.
3) Research.
4) Organize index cards and
the good stuff from those handwritten pages.
A) Get a three-ring binder
notebook, dividers, and plastic sheet protectors that can
hold weird-sized scraps of paper or index cards.
B) Cut out the parts from
morning pages that have to do with your story and put them
into your notebook where they belong. Put anything that
seems relevant into the appropriate sections of this notebook.
I organize my notebook in the order closest to the story’s
actual shape. My dividers are labeled premise, proposal,
research, setting, character, and plot. I divide the plot
section into beginning/inciting incident, act one, act two,
act three, or first big moment, second big moment etc.,
black moment, crisis, resolution. I stick a lot of my research
into this notebook. That way I have my book in one place,
and I can carry it around if I wish. Usually, my notebooks
get so fat, I end up with more notebooks. I am extremely
disorganized when I create. This system organizes me.
5) Define premise. Refine your
ideas into one single, controlling idea. Express it in a
single sentence that contains a compelling dramatic question.
6) Develop characters.
A) Hero and heroine should have
good hearts. They should not be perfect.
B) Think about archetypes
C) Backstory
D) Break in Character-- Who does
this character think he is? Who does his family think he
is? Who does the world think he is? What are his dreams?
His beliefs? Vulnerabilities? Ideas in conflict. Complex
characters aren’t who they seem to be, want to be, or pretend
to be. This is where internal conflict is born. Your story
must force your characters to grow or gain insight.
E) Give your main characters three
or four strong traits or beliefs that control his behavior,
one of which can change. The trait that changes can be
a flaw that changes because of what your character learns
in your story. Scenes should slam this particular trait,
forcing him to grow.
F) Think about casting. Throw conflicted
characters into complex, conflicting relationships with
other powerful characters who are not like them, who react
differently and, therefore, maddeningly to the same stimuli.
7) Give your main characters
clear, vital, deep-rooted conflicting goals. The characters
do not have to know what their real need or goal is or approve
of it. But your character must need something so desperately
that if he doesn’t get it, he can’t be whole. Goals must
come out of who the characters are and must be well motivated.
Think about several types of goals for your people—the main
goal that spans entire novel as well as temporary or immediate
scene goals. Usually my characters don’t know what they’re
about. Usually, their major flaw blocks necessary self-knowledge.
They may not admit they are unhappy, but if they weren’t lucky
enough to fall into my story, they would have stayed messed
up forever. Plot events should force them to discover who
they are and what they want. In the beginning they may fight
their true goal or dramatic need.
8) Plot. At this point, I take
a look at a book map of The Screenwriters Workbook
by Syd Field.
A) I study the paradigm for screenplays
set out in that book.
B) I get out a large poster board,
a dry erase board, or sometimes even a scroll of Christmas
wrapping paper. Sometimes I use the white or back side
of the wrapping paper because it is more portable than a
poster.
C) Then I take out index cards
and post-it notes. I list things that can happen to characters,
things that need to happen to them. Think about romantic
conflict and external conflict. The romantic conflict comes
from deep within the personalities of these two characters—why
don’t they believe their relationship could work? How do
they have to change or grow to resolve their relationship?
D) Think up scenes that slam them
and dramatize the characters’ internal growth and their
romantic bonding.
E) Test their love. Test leads to
black moment, crisis, epiphany, character growth, and resolution.
F) In plotting, remember, events
that happen in your story are best if they spring from actions
your characters take to solve problems. Such events should
set off a chain reaction of dramatic, interesting emotional
reactions and actions that keep your story moving. Your
characters’ emotions are always more important than
the actions.
G) Think up worst-case scenarios
for your particular characters and worst-case but highly-attractive
love interests for them. Dramatize conflicts on index cards
or post-it notes. Cards should contain scene ideas. Think
about these questions when thinking about scenes: what has
to happen? Where? What is argument? What is point of
scene? Then how should conflict be revealed in scene—through
dialogue, thoughts, or action? Whose viewpoint?
H) Arrange these scenes in most
dramatic order.
I) Stick post-it notes
on poster in best order. Keep in mind that even if you
don’t write the book exactly as you are planning it, planning
it forces you to think about it, which is how you get the
good stuff that seems accidental.
9) Write.
A) If I am having a hard time with
a scene, I pull out every note, scrap of paper that has
dialogue a character description etc, and all the research
I need for this section of the book. I put these materials
into a single manila file folder or sheet protector.
B) Organize these bits of paper
into a stack that is in chronological or in scene order.
C) Get them into computer in the
order you believe they should be. Usually, the work will
starts getting easier.
D) No matter how negative or
blocked you feel, write. Write something, every day.
E) If you are extremely negative,
give El Negativo or La Negativa a notebook of his/ hers
and let him/her write. When he/she is done, get back to
your real work. Set writing goals and commit blocks of
time toward this project.
F) Write. Let yourself write
badly. After about a hundred pages, I usually find my characters
and book. Sometimes great scenes spring into my mind that
have very little to do with all the plotting and planning
I did in the beginning.
G) Usually, I replot my synopsis
after I’ve written the first fifty pages.
10) Endings. About three-fourths
of the way through a book, I usually reread and redesign the
book again to try to figure out the very best ending for my
story. I usually write the last two or three chapters in
a day or two after it comes to me.
11) Revision. I keep
printed pages in a three-ring binder. When I have revision
ideas, I write them on post-it notes and stick them on the
pages to be revised or stick them into a sheet-protector that
contains all revision notes for that chapter. Try to avoid
constant revision when writing. When story sags, remember
that conflict is the gasoline that drives your story and that
must drive every scene. Ask yourself what is the conflict?
What is your character doing to resolve the conflict? Tip:
wherever possible, cut.
12) Tips I’ve learned through
the years. How to use how-to-write books. Depression. Rumors
about the writing business. Happiness. Writer’s block. Burn-out.
Jealousy. Speed. Silent retreats.
13) Books and workshops
A) The Screenwriter’s Workbook
by Syd Field and anything by Dwight Swain
B) Maximum Achievement by
Brian Tracy
C) I think Laura Baker’s and Robin
L. Perini’s workshop on Story Magic would be great. I enjoyed
Robert McKee’s workshop on Structure and David Freeman’s
workshop on Beyond Structure.
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