The Concept To Make A Novel For Newbie (from How To.Novel Author)

The Fictional World

1. Get inspired. Writing a novel is a creative process, and you never know when a good idea might come to you. Carry a notebook and a pen so you can jot down ideas wherever you go. You might feel inspired by something you hear on your morning commute, or while daydreaming in a coffee shop. You never know when you'll be inspired, so you should keep your eyes and ears open wherever you go.

• Use your notebook to write fragments - paragraphs, or even sentences, that will become part of a more complete story.

• Think about all of the stories you've been told -- stories passed down from your great-grandmother, a story that fascinated you on the news, or even a ghost story from your childhood that has stuck with you.

• Consider a moment from your childhood or past that stuck with you. It could be the mysterious death of a woman in your town, your old neighbor's obsession with pet ferrets, or a the trip you took to London that you can't stop thinking about.

• People say that you should "write what you know." Others believe that you should "write about what you don't know about what you know." Think of something from your own life that has inspired, troubled, or intrigued you -- how can you explore this topic more fully in a novel?

2. Consider your genre. Not every novel fits neatly into a certain category, but it’s helpful to think about your intended genre and audience as you begin planning your work. Read all of the major works that fall into your chosen genre to get a good understanding of how to construct a novel according to the standards of your chosen genre. And if you haven't completely decided on one genre or are working in more than one genre, then it's no problem -- it's more important to be aware of what tradition you're working in than to stick to one specific genre or category. Consider the following options:

• Literary novels are intended to be works of art, complete with deep themes, symbolism, and complex literary devices. Read classic works by the great novelists and refer to helpful lists like The Guardian’s ”100 Greatest Novels of All Timer or 100 New York Times Best Seller Novels All Times.

• Commercial novels are intended to entertain audiences and sell a lot of copies. They are divided into many genres, including science fiction, mysteries, thrillers, fantasies, romances, and historical fiction, among others. Many novels in these genres follow predictable formulas and are written in long series.

• There is plenty of crossover between literary and commercial novels. Many writers of science fiction, fantasies, thrillers, and so on create novels just as complex and meaningful as writers of novels that are classically “literary.” Just because a novel sells well does not mean it isn’t a work of art.

• Whatever genre you like or choose to focus on, you should read as many novels within that genre if you haven't already. This will give you a better sense of the tradition you'll be working in -- and how you can add to or challenge that tradition.

3. Consider your setting. Once you’ve decided which genre (or genres) to write within, start dreaming up a setting for your novel. This goes beyond the particular city where your characters will dwell; you’ve got an entire universe to dream up. The setting you create will determine the mood and tone of your novel, and will affect the problems your characters will face. Think about these questions as you sketch out the parameters of the new world you’re creating:

• Will it be loosely based on places that are familiar to you in real life?

• Will it be set in the present, or in some other time?

• Will it take place on Earth, or somewhere imaginary?

• Will it be centered in one city or neighborhood, or expanded to a range of locations?

• Will it take place over the course of a month, a year, or decades?

• Will the world be cast in shadows, or will it inspire optimism?

4. Create your characters. The most important character of your novel will be your protagonist, who should be fleshed out with recognizable personality traits and thought patterns. Protagonists don’t necessarily have to be likable, but they are usually relate-able in some way so that readers stay interested in the story. One of the joys of reading fiction is recognizing yourself and living vicariously through your favorite characters.

• Your protagonist and other characters don't have to be likable, but do have to be interesting. Like Lolita's Humbert Humbert, the character can be despicable -- as long as he is fascinating.

• Your novel also doesn't have to have just one protagonist. You can have multiple characters that engage the readers, and can even play around with telling the story from multiple points of view.

• Your world should be populated with other characters too. Think about who will interact with your protagonist, serving as either friends or foils.

• You don't have to know exactly who will populate your novel before you begin. As you write, you may find that your real protagonist is actually one of the minor characters you created, or you may find new characters creeping up where you didn't expect them to be.

• Many novelists describe thinking of their characters as real people, asking themselves what the characters would do in a given situation and doing their best to stay “true” to the characters. Your characters should be so well-developed in your mind that it feels natural to help them navigate your fictional world.

 

5. Visualize the plot. Most novels, regardless of genre, have some sort of conflict. Tension builds until the problem comes to a climax, and then it’s resolved in some way. This doesn’t mean novels always have happy endings; it’s more about providing motivations for the characters’ actions and creating a vehicle for change and meaning across the span of your novel.

• There is no set formula for the plot of a perfect novel. Though one traditional approach is to have rising action (building the details and tension in the story), a conflict (the main crisis of the novel), and a resolution (the final outcome of the crisis), this is not the only way to do it.

• You can start with a central conflict and work backwards to show why it matters. For example, a girl can be returning home for her father's funeral, and the reader may not know why this is going to lead to a major conflict momentarily.

• Your novel also doesn't have to neatly "resolve" the conflict. It's okay to leave some loose ends undone.

• Your novel also doesn't have to be linear. It can start in the present can can jump back and forth between the past and the present, or it can start in the past and jump ahead twenty years -- do whatever works best for telling your story. For an example of a nonlinear novel, see Hopscotch by Julio Cortázar.

• Read some of your favorite novels and follow the plot arc. See how the novel is put together. This can be even more interesting if the novel isn't linear.

 

6. Decide on a point of view. Novels are typically written in the third or the first person, though they can also be written in the second person, or in a combination of multiple perspectives. The first person is the "I" voice that is told directly from the point of view of a character; the second person, less commonly used, addresses the readers as "you" and tells the reader exactly what he or she is doing, and the third person describes a character or set of characters from an outside perspective.

• You don't have to decide on the point of view of the novel before you write the first sentence. In fact, you may write the first chapter -- or even the entire draft of the first novel -- before you have a better idea of whether the novel will sound better in the first person or the third.

• There's no hard and fast rule about what point of view will work better for what type of novel. But if you're writing a panoramic novel with a wide variety of characters, the third person can help you manage all of the characters that populate your novel.

7. Consider starting from scratch. Though it's great to start with a genre, plot, characters, and a setting in mind, if you want to write a novel, you shouldn't get too bogged down with all these details first. You can get inspired by something simple -- a historical moment, a snatch of a conversation you hear in the grocery store, or a story your grandmother once told. This can be enough to get you writing and to start creating something from what you already know.

• If you're too worked up about getting the details figured out before you write a draft, you may actually be stifling your own creativity.