Writing—So You Want to be a Writer, How is a Novel Written? Brainstorming Telic Ideas, more on Plots

29 June 2018, this blog is about writing in scenes.  I’m focusing on the tools to build scenes.  I’ll leave up the parts of a novel because I think this is an important picture for any novelist.  I’m writing about how to begin and write a novel.

1. The initial scene
2. The rising action
3. The Climax
4. The falling action
5. The dénouement

Announcement:   I need a new publisher.  Ancient Light has been delayed due to the economy and it may not be published.  Ancient Light includes Aegypt, Sister of Light and Sister of Darkness.  If you are interested in historical/suspense literature, please give my novels a try.  You can read about them at http://www.ancientlight.com.  I’ll keep you updated.

Today’s Blog: The skill of using language comes from the ability to put together figures of speech that act as symbols in writing.

Short digression:  back in the USA.

Here are my rules of writing:

1. Entertain your readers.
2. Don’t confuse your readers.
3. Ground your readers in the writing.
4. Don’t show (or tell) everything.

4a. Show what can be seen, heard, felt, smelled, and tasted on the stage of the novel.

5. Immerse yourself in the world of your writing.

 

Creativity is the extrapolation of older ideas to form new ones or to present old ideas in a new form.  It is a reflection of something new created with ties to the history, science, and logic (the intellect).  Creativity requires consuming, thinking, and producing.

Scene development:

Here is the beginning of the scene development method from the outline:

 

1. Scene input (comes from the previous scene output or is an initial scene)
2. Write the scene setting (place, time, stuff, and characters)
3. Imagine the output, creative elements, plot, telic flaw resolution (climax) and develop the tension and release.
4. Write the scene using the output and creative elements to build the tension.
5. Write the release
6. Write the kicker

 

First step of writing—enjoy writing.  Writing is a chore—especially if you don’t know what you are doing, and you don’t know where you are going.  Let me help you with that.

 

How do we gain the skills to write well?  Let’s begin with reading.  Reading allows us to understand the following:

 

1. What a novel is.
2. How a novel is constructed.
3. How a novel is entertaining.
4. How a novel is written.
5. How novels have evolved.
6. Different genre in novels.

 

If we understand what makes a novel entertaining, we can move on to how a novel is written.

 

This idea incorporates significant concepts about writing.  First of all, the author must be a skilled reader.  Second, the author must be a skilled writer.  Third, the author must have an idea.  Forth, the author must have the discipline to write a novel.

 

Brainstorming, lists, dreams, daydreaming, life events, technology, setting, and plot outlining might produce ideas worth writing.  How do we find an idea to write about?

 

You can write a novel based on a brainstormed idea from a list—let’s explore these ideas in all their parts.  If you notice from the list above, all the words following brainstorming are examples of lists for brainstorming.

 

Why not make a list of plot or plot types.  You don’t have to fully outline or make even a short outline.  Why not just list some plot types or plots that would interest you.  I did this with my latest novel, Blue Rose Enchantment and the Detective.  I wrote about writing a detective telic flaw, and then I wrote the novel based on it.  I was a little more detailed than that.  Here is an example list:

 

Detective plots:

1. Murder
2. Kidnapping
3. Theft
4. Extortion
5. And there’s more

 

I actually included murder and extortion in my novel—and more.  You don’t have to caveat the overall subject.  Here is a generic list:

 

1. Love
2. Hate
3. Business problems
4. Unrequited love
5. Magic
6. Dragons
7. Royalty

 

Okay, okay, this list might be too generic, but it might give you some ideas.  I like to be a little more specific with my potential lists, then again, I like to start with the protagonist and not the plot.  You might start with historical events:

 

1. World War I
2. World War II
3. Korea
4. Vietnam
5. Iraq

 

And so on.  You might drive down into battles or other areas you are familiar with.  You really need to be familiar or gain familiarity with your potential subjects.  When I chose to write The Second Mission, I did not have much familiarity with ancient Greek, but I was familiar with the Greek documents in translation.  I had a plan to learn to translate the Greek well enough to provide my own translations—that’s what I did.

 

In any case, this is just one method in the many I’ve shown you that might help get your creativity going.  Creativity and imagination are the means to produce a novel length idea.

 

I’ll write more tomorrow.

For more information, you can visit my author site www.ldalford.com/, and my individual novel websites:

http://www.ancientlight.com

www.aegyptnovel.com

http://www.sisteroflight.com

http://www.sisterofdarkness.com

www.centurionnovel.com

www.thesecondmission.com

www.theendofhonor.com

www.thefoxshonor.com

www.aseasonofhonor.com

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