[Cue sonorous voiceover] Previously on “So You Want to Write a Book?”: Part 1, How I got started. Detailing in great, umm, detail, how a particular writer went from “I’m not ever going to be ‘a novelist’!” to being, well, just that. And how said writer wrote their first novel by sitting down and starting to type on a chilly November day in 2011.
Part 2: Other Ways of Writing a Book – How to Plan a Book
So, as I said last time, I didn’t even set out to “write a book”, because I didn’t know I could. But I could sit down and start typing, and tell myself a story I liked.
That’s one way of writing a book: sit down and start writing.
However, that’s not the only way. There are other options, possibly even better ones. And the rest of this post is going to be dedicated to telling you about one or maybe two others.
The option outlined above, the just-sit-down-and-start-typing one, in the NaNoWriMo community is knows as “pantsing”: writing by the seat of your pants. The other option is its exact opposite, and it’s called “plotting”.
It’s pretty much what it sounds like: planning your book before you start. Like a wily housebreaker plotting their crime, you plan how your book is going to unfold.
Hah, that’s an easy thing to say in one sentence. Doing it is a whole other matter. There are so many different ways of approaching this, people get whole MFAs and PhDs in this stuff, and there’s been reams and reams of books written about it. So, this is just to let you know that what I’m going to tell you next barely scratches the surface of this topic, and that if you enjoy learning about this, hurrah! You have a lifetime of fun ahead of you. (Just, for example, go to YouTube, type in “Outlining a novel”, and I’ll see you back here in about three months.)
And, another point: pantsing and plotting are not an either/or, they’re more of a continuum (yes, NaNoWriMo has a term for a point in the middle, too: “plantsing”). You can plot anywhere from just a little bit down to the tiniest detail. It’s all valid and it all works.
So, how to start?
Quite simply: a book has to be about something. You need someone who is somewhere doing something, and that something has to have a beginning, a middle and an end.
That sounds utterly obvious—but actually, I’ve just given you six different ways to start on your story.
Say what?
Let’s break it down:
–Someone: the main character or characters (Who).
–Somewhere: the setting, i.e. place and time (Where/When).
–Something: the plot or events (What)
–Beginning: how it all starts
–Middle: what’s going on
–End: how it finishes up
Any of those six points is a place to start your story. Maybe you know who your character is (Frodo Baggins, a hobbit). Maybe you know where and when it takes place (Middle Earth, the Third Age). Maybe you know what happens (there’s an evil magic ring that needs to be destroyed). Or maybe you have a beginning (“Netherfield Park is let at last!”). Maybe you have the middle (a botched proposal scene). Maybe you have the end (a wedding).
So, I suggest you get yourself something to write—pen and paper or a notebook, a laptop with word processing software, whatever. This is only the preliminary tool, not the one you’ll be writing your book in, so I’d recommend a paper notebook—much quicker to boot up than a computer.
Here are the steps to writing your novel:
Step 1: Ideas. Start making notes. Just jot down whatever comes into your head. Do you have a person in mind? An event? A setting? A scene, a few sentences of dialogue, an image… (C.S. Lewis started The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe from a picture of a faun with an umbrella standing under a lantern in a snowy woods.)
Write down anything and everything to do with your story that you think of. Even if it’s silly. Especially if it’s silly. Write it down even if it contradicts what you just wrote down before. Make lists of what you could possibly write about. Or if you already know where you want to go with the story, write that down too. Write down whatever you know about the characters, or the setting, or the plot. If you’ve got a big system of elvish lore and language knocking around in your head, write it down. If you know that your main character has a mole on their left shoulder blade, write it down.
Step 2: The Overview—fill in the first three points. By which I mean, decide on the Who, Where/When, and a single sentence of the What. If in Step 1 you’ve decided on a character, now find them a place & time to be in and something to do. If your starting point was a plot event, find the people who act it out and the place they do it in. If your starting point is the setting, find characters and a plot.
Step 3: The Rough Outline. In other words, the next three points: What’s the beginning, middle and end of the plot? What happens first that starts the story, what’s the central problem and how do the characters tackle it, and what’s the solution?
Step 4 (and possibly 5, 6, 7, and 8): The Full Outline—refine the rough outline (and refine it more, and more, if you want). This is where you decide section by section, and/or chapter by chapter, or even scene by scene (your choice), what happens.
Step 5 (or whatever comes next): WRITE THE THING. This is where you actually articulate the story. Where you tell what happens, describe the setting, make the characters talk.
But there is too much to be said about that than fits into this post.
…TO BE CONTINUED…