How To Write A Novel

Have you ever wanted to write a novel? If you are like me, than writing a novel is a dream that has never left your mind. If you are waiting to lift that pen and get to work on the next best seller, then this article is calling your name!

1.      Okay, obviously everyone has their “way” of writing a novel. Some people like to dive right into it (honestly they must have been formed by God’s tears if they have that kind of an ability) and others like to plan the first chapter. Many people (like myself) like to plan the entire novel—from chapter one to the end. For the sanity of this magical article, we are going to venture down the road of actually planning a novel out. AND! What to do once you have finished that last beautiful chapter of yours.

2.      Discover The Plot. This process goes very differently for each person; however, it needs to be done of course. Some people like to sit down with their ruler sketched “WEB” diagram and sit there until an idea comes to mind, while others use life as their playground when finding ideas to write about. Regardless of your approach, you need to ALWAYS have an open mind when it comes to writing novels—the best ideas come from places you least expect.

·         One of my novel ideas came from my least favorite class—history. (I know, I know, everyone is going to start yelling at me, “How can you hate history but love writing?!” My answer…well it’s boring.) Back to the article before I was so rudely interrupted. I was sitting in class, enduring a 3 hour lecture, and the teacher talked about a topic which instantly sparked an interest for a novel idea. When I ran home like a little girl who just discovered the lost ark of candy, I sat down and branched my novel off that sole idea.

·         I’ve heard some authors say that their ideas come from dreams. Once your novel idea about machines that take over the world, or magical ponies that harness the power to make it rain chocolate—it is time to move on.

3.      Create the Main Character! Sounds obvious enough, but many people tend to skip this step. “Oh, I’ll come back to itttt.” This isn’t true for EVERY novel, but the main character could possibly be more important than the setting, story, or the major twist. If the reader cannot relate, or enjoy the main character, then it won’t sell. But I am sure that doesn’t come to a shock for you.

·         The main “GOOD” character cannot be a perfect and flawless being. Your reader needs to be able to connect and relate with the character. Let’s take our Chocolate Pony Adventures for example. “Lala the Pony is constantly being bullied by his fellow pony friend. Lala enjoys long walks on the beach, and becomes the hero of the town when he makes it rain chocolate!”

·         Same with the “BAD” guy. The antagonist can’t be just all evil, or the reader will think it is just a rock. In the novels you have read, or the movies you have seen, the bad guy usually has a reason for the things they are doing, and it seems very justified to them. For example, “Bigglesberth the Pony has a long black streak running down his back and hates the sweet taste of chocolate, so he go outs to sabotage Lala’s coco fest.

4.      Secondary Character. They are just as important as your main characters. Many people feel they aren’t very important because you can just slap down a hair and eye color and there is a character. WRONG. These characters are like the condiments to a delicious cheeseburger. (Can you tell I’m hungry?)Plus, many reader’s favorite character is a secondary character. (You ever notice that?) The reason why that is, is because most secondary characters have one strong characteristic that relatives to a certain reader. Trust me, they are IMPORTANT.

5.      Start writing—NOT! Sleep on it. Writing a compelling novel is not as easy as 1-2-3. Or A-B-C. Or you-and-me. (That went too far?) Sleep on it, thinking about, eat on it, think about it, drive on it, think about it, dream on it, think about it, talk on it, and think about it. Do you see any patterns? The more and more you leave your mind open to your novel, the more information you will develop for it. When I start writing a novel, 90% of my daily thought process is devoted to my novel. Not because I chose to, but because it is just natural for me now. I love writing. We have one more thing to cover before we venture into the actual writing process. (We aren’t there yet?!)

6.      Plan the novel out. If you aren’t the type of person who likes to plan their novels out (and I hope you will if this is your first novel ever. If you are Stephen King, by all means, skip this part.)

·         The best way to do this is plan each chapter out. Does not interest you? Well too bad, it will help you GREATLY. You need to treat each chapter as its own novel. That chapter needs a beginning, it needs a middle, a climax, and an ending (ending is a trickier). If you are writing an action novel, you can’t have 40 million fights in that one chapter that acts as 40 million climaxes. I know, I know, it would be epic on the big screen, but as a novel it will not translate.

·         Each chapter needs to be able to hold its own, they can’t act as bridges. And what I mean by bridges. The chapter can’t just be a whole chapter on the character traveling through the malevolence forest to get to the other side. Everyone is screaming, “But, but, in so-and-so…” Yes, I know, many novels have a bridge chapter, but its one chapter. And it is usually a short chapter. If you start to have many “bridge” chapters, then you should invent a small story to put in that chapter. This leads me to the next bullet.

·         Leave breathing room! I can’t stress that enough. When you plan the chapters out, don’t put down so much detail that you can’t add information down the line. Trust me, you WILL wake up one day and be all, “WOAH THAT WOULD BE COOL.” And want to add it into your story, but you can’t because you packed your chapters down. This will become hard for new writers, but once you do it once, the next novel will be a cinch.

·         Don’t plan your entire novel in one day—it will not come out nice. Do 3 chapters a day. Or even less. The more time you place in-between, the more new information you will come across to place in the novel.

·         Lastly. Plan. Twists. Try as hard as you can to make sure the ending of each chapter makes your reader want MORE. Have you ever been reading a novel at 1am, you are about to finish a chapter, and you say to yourself, “Okay, after this chapter, I am going to bed.” And then, you reach the end of the chapter and you scream, “BIGGLESBERTH DID WHAT?!” And then you stay up and read and end up losing your job because you over slept. (I’m not bitter…I swear)

7.      Time to start writing. Take a deep breath. (Inhale. Exhale.) You have just accomplished possibly the hardest part of writing a novel. (Authors are laughing at me right now. I have yet to get to the publishing part.)

·         Have the ending of the story in mind. (Hopefully, since you planned your novel out…riiiiiight? Having the ending in mind will be easy for you.) Having the ending in mind will help you through the whole story. The reason why? Because readers do not like a predictable ending, but what they love is when they re-read a novel and the whole time they are saying to themselves, “How did I not see that?” When you have the ending in mind, you are able to create very, very subtle clues that can only be noticed once the reader has read the story once.

·         Your first chapter will be the most important. You will find yourself re-writing, editing, and stressing over your first chapter more than any other. Why? Because it is the deciding chapter for readers, and for publishers. The best way to make a great first chapter is to dive right into action. The most common advice is to use the whole “Future, back to present,” technique. If you don’t know what that is, that technique is when you start off in action that happens later on in the novel, and then come back to present time. It is effective, but I feel as if it is a cop out. It has been done enough times. So try to be creative if you can. Soon I will be making a article on how to write a killer first chapter.

·         The first paragraph and even the first sentence are so important. And you may not even see it. Many readers, like myself, walk into a book store, open a book, and read the first paragraph. And if it doesn’t catch my attention, I will place it back without a second chance. It HAS to be gripping. First impressions mean a lot. I feel so intense about the first paragraph thing, that I will provide a quick example of a good first paragraph and a bad one.

·         BAD. I woke up to the quiet sun that was looming over my eyes. I tried to wipe the light off my face, but it just wasn’t budging. My mom walked into the room and pulled the blinds up more…

·         Good. The squall shattered my eye sight. My hands searched for the end of my bed, but the lightning was too intense. The spiraling wind rocked the house like a plane in turbulence. Was I about to die?

·         New writers tend to use the first example because they feel it is more “elegant.” Which is nice for poetry, but not here. Read. Read. Read. The more you read, the more you notice.

8.      The habit and commitment. Ohhh the fun part. This right here is where about 95% of new writers go astray. Your desk is probably filled with a bunch of unfinished novels and ideas. I have a lot of writer friends, and I hear every excuse. An excuse will merit is the, “I had a better idea for a novel.” Which happens to every author. You start writing your novel, and another cool novel idea pops in your head and you are dying to write it. Trust me—write the new idea down, and finish your first project. If you don’t, you will never finish a novel.

·         Habit. Habit. Habit. (I wrote “Hobbit” three times in a row on accident.) I have heard people say to write every single day. Even if it is just a sentence. For me, I can’t do that. When I write, I have to at least write a whole chapter, I cannot do spurts. But that is up to you. However, don’t write every single day. (I can hear the advice haters typing hate mail already. “What do you mean don’t write every day, how dare you give new writers that advice!”) YES! Do not write every day. There. I said it. Your creative mind needs a rest at times. If you write every day, you never give your mind time to explore new ideas to make your novel better.

·         Create a schedule. If you plan on being an author, then writing will turn into a career for you, and like a career, you cannot be late. Say to yourself, I will write 1 chapter a week. 2 chapters a week. Or even 3 chapters a week. Either way, agree to a schedule, and keep to it. There will be days where you don’t want to write, and if you are just writing for fun, and then don’t write, but if you plan on being a dedicated author, then you have to force yourself. Once you do, your habits will change.

·         Make it enjoyable. If you are writing in the first place, then you love to write. You have not gotten this far in the article if writing does not bring joy to your heart. (God, I am getting cheesy.) However, you can make it more enjoyable when you aren’t in the mood to write. For me, I would write a chapter on my days off, but on Saturday, I would wake up, go to Dunkin’ Donuts, grab a vanilla iced coffee and a sausage egg and cheese on a plain bagel, drive around with the windows down and music playing, think about the chapter I’m about to write, and go home and write it. It turned into something I longed for. I couldn’t wait for Saturday. And then when my novel was done, I would go to Dunkin Donuts and instantly the desire to write would flood me.

·         That is just a personal example. That novel on the side is not by me. Sadly, I have no read it but my friends told me it was a fantastic book, and has great reviews. I trust them and I thought you guys may be interested.

9.      Feedback. I hate this, but it is most definitely helpful. You need to find friends to give you feedback, and you need to trust them. A parent is great as well. And if those are not a choice for you, than an editor.

10.  Rewrite / editing. Many new writers tend to skip this part. They write their final chapter and they ship it off to agents. New writers think, “Well that is why agents have editors, right?” Wrong. If an agent reads your work and sees constant mistakes, they will not continue. Trust me. Rewrite your novel, edit it, have friends edit it, and edit it again. You have caught mistakes in published novels; you know there is no end to editing. Keep an original file just in case you over edit. (Yes there is such thing.) Editing is the most boring part (for most authors) and the most tedious, but it is just as important as writing the novel—if not more.

11.  Publish. There is so much to publishing. I will dedicate an entire article on this.

PLEASE READ! IMPORTANT. The most vital thing you can do is have a USB. I cannot tell you how many horror stories I have heard from fellow writers that have lost their novel. Have a file of your novel. A file that contains each chapter as a separate document. And save it on a USB every time you write a chapter. Do it, trust me. A USB is the best investment you will ever make, after writing a novel, of course. Happy writing. Contact me if you will to use my Chocolate Magical Pony story!