How To Write A Novel

Posted by Brett Slansky | 8:00 AM | 0 comments »

By Rebecca Bennett


The thought of writing a novel resides in the minds of thousands of people. Many more have excellent ideas that would make best sellers and classical novels. However, many people do not have an idea of how to write a novel. For those who have succeeded, this is one of the most rewarding experience. By following simple steps, you will realize your dream in months without struggle.

Begin by writing a summary of your story. This summary should be a single sentence that is less than fifteen words. This sentence will be used to sell your book once it is completed. It will be valuable as you seek to convince editors, committees and book stores to stock your title. It must not contain the names of characters. An example is what would be found on reviews by major news outlets.

Follow up the sentence by expanding it into a summary paragraph. This paragraph is a brief of the main occurrences and characters in your story. It captures the triumphs and disasters in three acts where the first introduces the main disaster, the second captures two other disasters while the third is the triumphant act and the ending. This should not exceed five sentences.

Characters play a crucial part in your story. They need to be developed after generating an idea of your story line. Decide on the names of the main characters. Supporting characters will be developed as the story grows. Summarize the story line of each character in one sentence. Provide a goal, conflict, epiphany and motivation of each of these characters.

In the process of drafting your plot and characters, you will encounter the need to change your summary sentence or paragraph. This is acceptable and an indication that the development process is teaching you something. There does not exist a perfect summary. So many other things will become clearer as the story develops.

The process of developing the story line and characters is time consuming and may takes weeks based on the amount of time dedicated. This is one of the most interesting novel writing phases. Upon completion of this exercise, develop a one-page summary of your novel. This is the summary that will be used to produce the first draft.

With clear details of scenes and characters, time has come for you to bind them into a single story. You will realize that you are engaging in a lot of filling. Characters and scenes that did not exist will have to be created. Avoid diluting or substantially changing your story line based on discoveries made when developing secondary characters. This stage is demanding and requires total concentration and a substantial amount of time.

Writing a novel requires dedication and focus. You must be committed to work on your goals till the end. Split the goals into fragments that make them manageable. Pick an end date which could be six months to one year depending on the time available. You will need to research on some facts even in situations where you are writing fiction.




About the Author:



0 comments