Photo by Danielle MacInnes on Unsplash The idea is to write a fifty thousand word novel in thirty days. An average of fifteen to seventeen hundred words a day for thirty days straight. Doable? Yes, and no. Yes. You can write two thousand words if you put the time in and put your mind to it. You have an idea, and putting it down on paper is the easiest task. No. Most likely the quality of your words, sentences, and ideas won't even be close to the final product that you’re going to want to publish. There are some who can write a great novel in a month. These are experienced writers in their genre, and their focus is typically on the number of books they can sell and not necessarily on the quality of what they write. Don't get me wrong. You could write an interesting book that sells, and many writers do that. However, if you want an intricate plot and character depth, you will need to spend some time making it right, researching, and rethinking your writing. Those quick writers are also very familiar with the expectations of their readers. They can produce a book every couple of months and start selling them instantly. However, I would like you to notice the writers that are famous for their work. Most of them are releasing a book a year, and even sometimes skip a release. Margaret Atwood published her first novel in 1969. To date, she has released only seventeen novels. The most recent one was in 2019. That is 0.3 novels a year. Of course, Steven King or Clive Cussler can write more than one novel a year, but for established, famous writers, this is more the exception than the rule. (Shh ... Some popular writers also have ghostwriters. They don't write all these books themselves.) Yes, you can write a great novel or novella in thirty days, but I guarantee most participants won’t write anything close to publishable. It takes a long time to find your way as a writer. What NaNoWriMo does is give you encouragement to write. So put your story on paper. Write it down, NaNoWriMo or not. The world wants your story, so start writing.
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Photo by Thought Catalog on Unsplash Because of the number of stories and plots that I put in my books, I don’t believe I have experienced writer’s block. I have lots of ideas that I would like to put on the pages. If I do not know how I want to write the next scene, I can always jump to a different scene that is clearer in my mind. What I experienced in the last few weeks is what I would call writer’s fatigue. With many changes to the manuscript, I had spent on average about 90 hours a month writing, editing, or working towards publishing the first book, such as researching the cover design. That’s on top of my regular full-time job. My brain was also going over and analyzing different scenarios and improvements to the same story. Thoughts have turned to absolute mush frequently where I lost track of which version of the story I was editing. Did these two people meet already or will they meet later? Did I already reveal this piece of information? Unfortunately, stepping away from the manuscript did not help in the long run, and I quickly found myself in the same situation. How did I fight that?
What did I learn? I need to work through the process of book writing one item at a time. One of the early mistakes that I made with my book was to rush things because I thought I could easily accomplish the tasks in front of me. I set my deadlines tight, and I was ready to put in the time and effort to get things done. This left me with no room to step away and breathe, and I kept pushing myself to do more writing and editing. It also caused a lot of anxiety trying to get things done, especially when others were waiting for me. In the end, the initial publish date that I was planning to have the book ready for had to be moved because of external factors. This meant that all the stress and the unhealthy attitude towards writing were pointless. The book will proceed on its own timeline that I won’t be able to influence in its entirety. I don’t think I can get away from putting the long hours into writing because once I sit down to write and I immerse myself in the story; it is hard for me to stop. However, I can be smarter with deadlines because writing is supposed to be fun and not stressful. Photo by: Zoltan Tasi unsplash.com/photos/0khu-rgbjzo?utm_source=unsplash&utm_medium=referral&utm_content=creditShareLink When readers pick up a novel, they relate to its characters and sometimes even relive their stories. To have these kinds of reactions from the reader, the characters need to follow one simple rule: be believable Making Sābanto's characters believable was very important when I created them. Here are a few points on the thought process of developing characters:
A Character Style Sheet is a separate document when you dump all you know about the characters. Their past, present and future aspirations. There is a process called Character Interviews that can help with writing Character Style Sheets. The character interview format provides a list of questions, helping the author build a detailed overview of the characters based on their answers. I procrastinated with writing a Character Style Sheet but I found it helpful once it was completed and it helped me find inconsistencies in the book. Sābanto tries to portray characters with a lot of history to shape them. I define their actions and motives and allow them to learn and grow. Are they believable and relatable? I hope so and I’m looking for feedback on that from my readers. Photo by Ewa Romanowicz I started writing a number of stories in the past but Sābanto is special, not only because it is the first book I am planning to publish but because it is the first story that I worked on ‘backwards’. I envisioned the end first, before I started to write the beginning. This approach worked well for me because I had a certain goal to achieve. Rather than trying to figure out how the story would end, I had to work out how to get there. The idea came to me as a short story in a very futuristic society. As I was reviewing and expanding the short story, I realized that the background of how Sābanto was created and how it evolved could be very interesting. I thought that the process of how our society got into that state needed to be defined more. My first step was to explain what Sābanto is and what it stands for. That is how Book 1 “The Crimson River” came to life. It was clear that the book would concentrate on the poor, so I decided to start from the ground up, the poorest of the poor. The base had been established. As a second step, I needed a character in the story who would push things forward and introduce the reader to Sābanto. That is how Oliver, the war veteran was born. The third step was to establish a motive. I knew what the final goal of the book was, but Oliver needed to have an internal or external push to get there. In a society where people were dying of cold and hunger, there had to be some contrast and that is how Oliver was entrusted with a fortune. And of course we need to have a conflict - something or someone in Oliver’s path that would lead to trouble. Someone who would tell him: “I know you from somewhere!” After giving Oliver a background story and building the initial world around him, I let him loose. Sābanto is definitely a character driven story. I did not have a clear idea how I wanted the book to proceed, so I let the characters show me the path. If the path was going sideways, I tweaked the characters. I also had to explore multiple paths for the same characters to see which one would make the story more interesting and believable but still continue the general path towards Sābanto. |