Well, here I am, starting work on my first novel. ....Perhaps that`s a bit inaccurate. My hard drive and ten-pound collection of notebooks say otherwise. So let`s rephrase that: Here I am, starting work on the first novel I might have a chance at actually finishing. That`s better.
Now let`s tackle the question many of you are probably asking right now: Why are you writing about writing?! Isn`t that tiring, not to mention way too meta? Plus, you`re not successful. You haven`t been published or anything. Why does it matter what you do?
1. Shut up, Pessimist!Mel. We might be someday.
2. I`ll want to know what worked or didn`t work this time around when I start writing my next novel. Writing is an extremely lengthy process, so by the time I get to the end, there`s a very real chance that the details about my work at the beginning will be kind of hazy. Documenting will help my memory, and streamline my processes.
3. I`m working on this in a teacher`s office in Japan, my English supervisor is on vacation, I don`t speak Japanese, and I don`t have a way to talk to anyone back home who might actually be awake at 1AM their time anyway. Writing to a potential audience makes me seem marginally less crazy than writing out conversations with myself in a notebook (and yes, that has happened today).
Is that enough housekeeping? Are you sitting comfortably? Then we`ll begin.
In the past, I`ve tried jumping straight into writing a novel when the idea struck me, and that didn`t work. Ditto the excessive research notes (I just get caught up in the research and never actually get anything done with it), notebooks full of pointform plotting notes, writing in the dark while sipping a glass of pinot noir (don`t ask), or anything else I`ve forgotten that I`ve done over the years. (Maps! Drawing maps was also unhelpful.) This time around, I`m working with Randy Ingermanson`s snowflake method of writing. So far, so good. I`m currently working on Step 5, which seems to be equal parts frantic typing, frantic scrolling through work on the previous steps every time you change or have forgotten something, and staring blankly at the screen while you listen to the voices in your head tell you their story. (Sane writers only happen in nonfiction.)
Step 1 was ridiculously easy for me, because I`ve been chewing on this story idea for a little more than a year now, so I had a pretty good idea what it was about. But it`s still helpful, as Randy suggests, to take a look at the sentences on the NYT Bestseller list to really get a feel for what you`re writing. Some of these sentences are indeed horrible, but it`s not true that you only learn from good things; sometimes you learn better from a solid example of what not to do than ten examples of what to do. Anyway. So I got my sentence written out, and I`m ready to move on! (My sentence is sixteen words, but I`m a rebel and don`t care.)
Step 2 is sort of the point where I would always falter, whether I was actually planning what I was doing or not. I had this fabulous over-arcing idea for my novel that I set out in Step 1, I knew how I wanted the story to start, I knew how it ended, but the middle (you know, the actual story bit, where everything happens and people develop and stuff) was a complete void. Spend a lot of time on this step, because this foundation is so, so, so important! Luckily, this time I`m working with a fractured fairy tale kind of thing, so I had some pre-existing plot points to work with, and I was able to twist them into the disasters I needed.
Step 3 is also really hard. Naming people sucks. I don`t have kids, but I would imagine that naming kids is a whole lot easier than naming fully-formed (or even partially-formed) characters. You already know this kid`s entire background, and their personality is pretty much a blank slate at this point. Unless you`re writing what could possibly be both the weirdest and most intriguing novel ever, in which every character is a newborn with blank-slate personalities, you have to come up with names for people who don`t necessarily have a full background yet, but you`re aware of some of their personality at the very least, and you have an idea of what they look like, so their name should suit that as well. Plus there are other levels to consider: Is the character based on someone, and you want to play with their name? Is this a `high fantasy` novel full of strange new cultures and customs? (If so, just keep dropping your cat on the keyboard and capitalizing the results.) Are the meanings of names important to you? Yet another complication at this stage is defining the goals, motivation, and conflict for your characters, especially if you`re like me and having a hard time figuring out the difference between goal and motivation the way Randy explains it. Susan Dennard does a great job breaking it down with relatable examples.
Step 4 is kind of a breeze, because everything you need for it has already entered your mind while you were working on the previous steps. Bear in mind that this is still just a skeleton.
And that brings us to where I am in Step 5. I started out writing the synopsis for my main character first (makes sense, right?). I tried writing it in the same narrative style I`m likely to use when I actually write it, but that was a horrible idea and I kept getting stuck, not to mention my verb tenses were all over the place. So I thought about it like this: you`re conducting some kind of interview with your character and preparing the report. The character synopsis should be in the first person, in the character`s voice, and follow the story from a natural starting point through to the conclusion. So much better. Now, the main character one is easy, because that`s the character you`ve been thinking about the most. You know most of the larger details of that story already. The problem comes when you`re working on the other characters, and you realize that there`s no meaning behind something, you don`t know why something else is occurring, and you need a plot point to happen but don`t know how to trigger it. This is where the writing out conversations with myself happened. I would normally consider a family member or close friend (preferably one who reads the kind of material you`re hoping to write) to bounce ideas off of, but barring that I will say that writing out that conversation does work. You know how when you`re trying to figure something out and you just need to talk through it out loud, and sometimes you can solve it without the other person even actually saying anything? It`s like that. Except the other person is a notebook and you`re writing it down instead of saying it out loud.
So that`s where I`m at right now. I`ve got about two hours left in my work day, so I`m hoping to have a couple more synopses done by then. Happy writing!
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