Introduction
The writing of “The
Marguerite Effect” was, in many ways, a chaotic experience. It doesn’t show
now because the finished product is actually the ninth major version. The chaos made the writing process both fun
and deeply frustrating and I vowed to do it differently the next time. Without
a plan I had no plot line to follow and no idea what was going to happen - even
on the next page. In many ways, it was more like reading a book than writing one. My creative writing course notes
and teaching literature suggested different methods of working, and several established
authors were kind enough to contribute insights on their own practices, but I
think it was too soon for me: I had to make the mistakes to realise the wisdom in
their words. It’s important to remember at this point that there is no “right way” to write a book. I’m
simply letting you know what happened during the writing of my first
novel and how I responded to these challenges to facilitate the second.
Nothing is set in stone, but I haven’t made any real changes to how I work for
six months or more now, so it looks as though I may have arrived at my own “optimal”
solution.
Below is a summary of how I work. If you’re struggling
to get started, or to stay focussed, try these methods and adapt them to you.
They’re all pretty loose and don’t require any special software but, for the
record, I use Microsoft Word, Microsoft Excel and Microsoft OneNote and will
refer to them. Each can be replaced with other software and some can be
replaced with paper-based solutions as you wish. “Other software packages are available”
as they say on the BBC.
Write the Synopsis First
By the time I began writing “The Blue Angels”, I had
learned my lesson about writing without a plan, so I wrote the synopsis first.
In this case, the synopsis was a bunch of bullet points, in (broadly) chronological
order that together expressed the turning points of the story. Each bullet
point can be a sentence or a paragraph and need not be written in well-formed
language. The important thing is that each moves the story on in some way by
expression an action. Here is a typical example from my OneNote notebook:
Hayle forces Milton to appear with him as
"Plato" in a televised press conference, threatening Lynda's life if
he doesn't go along with it.
Keep on adding bullet points until you have the
outline of your plot. This will guide you when you feel lost or temporarily overwhelmed.
Revisit Your Synopsis for Character Development
Once the
plot outline is complete, you will have what is effectively a child’s version
of your story. I say a child’s version, as each part of the plot may well lack
any nod to character motivation. “A does this. A does that. B does something to
A” Now is the time to ask yourself why these things happen. Revisit your
synopsis and ask yourself questions: Why
would A do this? Could it happen? What would be necessary for it to happen?
What would the effects of it be and do they chime with the plot points further
down? How would A have to be feeling in order to do this and how would it make
B feel? By asking these questions and expanding your bullet points with
thoughts as to the answers, you will address several fundamental issues. For
one, you will start to consider your character’s personalities. You will also
start to think more about the setting and the backdrop to the story. You will
probably want to make a note of your characters’ personality traits,
handedness, appearance etc. (again, I use OneNote) so that motivations and
descriptions are consistent throughout the plot. You might be surprised how
much the plot outline changes at this stage but that’s fine: it’s all a part of
the process. It’s far better to have to make big changes now when you have perhaps
3,000 words rather than later, when you have 83,000.
Revisit Your Synopsis for Continuity
Now
that you know what happens and why, you’ll also want to think about where it
happens, when it happens, and how long it all takes. If you don’t consider
these dimensions, you might find your characters live in a world of permanent
daylight, or take a day to walk across the room. These are extreme mistakes,
but are surprisingly easy to commit. At this stage, I find it useful to
annotate the bullet points with location, start date/time and end date/time.
Again, the plot may change at this stage, but I find that, by now, things will
be much more stable.
[Day 6, 14:00CDT to 15:00CDT, Church compound, Texas] Hayle
forces Milton to appear with him as "Plato" in a televised press
conference, threatening Lynda's life if he doesn't go along with it.
Model Your Characters, Locations and Equipment
By
now your characters will be well defined, at least in terms of their motivations,
but what do they look like? How do they move? Are they left-handed, musical
etc. What brought them to where they are?
These
questions may appear daunting, but it’s worth taking a little effort here for
the sake of continuity and to help you get inside your character’s heads, which
is vital for convincing dialogue and flow. By a “little effort” I mean, “as
much as is necessary at this stage”. Don’t feel that you have to write full CVs
for everyone, and remember that not everything you decide upon here needs to
end up in your story: it’s there to inform you,
the author. How much of it is given to the reader, and how quickly, is up to
you. I use OneNote to create a page for each character and location used, and
hyperlink them together to establish relationships. Here is an example that I
created for “Milton Styles” who is the main character of the “The Blue Angels”.
·
Hero
·
Aged 38
·
6'2"
That
was all I needed to get started. Each of the links leads to a separate page
which describes the character, location or item of equipment as appropriate. As
I write, I may throw in an eye colour, or handedness. If so, I should add it
here, so that I can remember what I wrote and keep it consistent later. I also
created a page for a “Beretta M9”, which is a pistol that appears in the story.
I know a lot about people, but very little about guns, so for that “character”
I did a lot of research and created a couple of pages with pictures and
technical details so that I could write about it accurately and realistically.
Research
If your
story concerns themes, locations or items etc. with which you are unfamiliar,
then research them. The internet is obviously a great resource for this but it’s
only one, and some of the “facts” reported on it may not be totally unreliable.
It’s up to you how thorough to be, but the more you learn, the more confident
you will be and the more detailed and realistic your prose will be. It’s
unlikely that you will perform all of your research before you write a word (I’m
always too impatient to start) but that’s OK: you can do it parallel, or as a break
from writing every now and then.
Write Your First Draft
Now
all of your plot points have cause and effect, place, time and duration. You
understand your characters and why they act the way they do. You feel confident
that you can refer in a realistic way to the locations and equipment used, even
if you might have to top-up as you go. All that remains now is for you to flesh
out the bones and to write your first draft. Don’t be afraid to revisit your
synopsis during the writing process as you may still have fresh ideas but beware:
if you don’t knuckle down you might find that you never finish! If you find
that the rate of change exceeds the rate of progress, then you probably need
more work on your synopsis. Stop what you’re doing and revisit it. The most
important thing here is to finish your first draft. Once you have that, you
will have done most of the hard creative work. You will need to redraft and perform some rework but, if you follow the
hints above, your redrafts will probably more akin to wallpapering or installing
a nice new rug than to building an extension. As a result, you will be a
happier, less stressed author. Well, that’s my experience anyway.
Coming
soon: "How to Load a Beretta M9" and "Keeping Track of Progress" #mixedbag
J
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