So what exactly goes into planning and starting a new story? Well, a lot. The beginning is always the exciting bit for most writers. They spend a lot of time in this space, thinking and imagining all the different characters and plots. For a lot of writers, this is the space they stay in.
They never get to the end.
But if you want to get to the end, then let me tell a little about how I do it.
The first stage of when I write a book, I call the festering or fermentation stage. It’s when there is an idea in my head and I have to let it fester there. Something magically happens when you only half focus on a thing. Your subconscious works on it, while you do other things. You think about it, to get the seed going, and then while you wash dishes, pick up the kids or work on other things, it manages to grow roots and expand. Every now and then you check in on it, just to make sure that it’s still in the fore-front of your mind.
I usually leave it for two to four weeks. Then I put pen to paper. And I don’t mean, finger to keyboard. I really mean, pen to paper. It’s brain dump time.
Everything about the story that I think is important, is spilled out of me onto paper, either in little drawings, diagrams, notes, ideas, texts. It’s important to get all of this out, because amongst all of this, a clear idea will come forth.
There are a number of things you need to get a good story together. You need growth for the character, an idea of where they’ve been, so you know where they going. You need a few characters, but one main is best.
But then you also need to think about the reader. This step is very important and often forgotten.
Why does the reader want to read your story? What do they want to find out? And that mystery is something that you have to master, because you know, but you mustn’t share when you write. Don’t give away the answer in the first chapter, else they won’t feel a need to read the rest of the book.
You have to entice.
There are several story arcs in play. There is the one of your character. There are the ones of the secondary characters. There is the overall journey of the book. There is the overall journey that goes beyond your book (especially if you thinking of more than one book).
There is also the world.
In this book, there are several realms that each need their own workings, style and creation.
Now – there is satisfaction in working it all about at once, but I find that if I do that, I often loose interest in the actual writing. I have to leave parts undone, so that I have internal puzzles to keep myself interested. This, I guess, is how I deal with procrastination which is a real thing for writers.
Now, you could suggest I work things out on the go, which is a tactic that other writers do. But I find that if you leave everything up to the book writing process, you tend to write a lot of junk that later on you have to cut out. My real worst phase of writing is the editor stage. So, for me personally, to reduce the amount of editing that needs to be done, as much as possible, I ensure my story is tight from the start. In fact, I rather go in and fluff up, then have to beat down.
Which is why I work out about 75-80%, leaving a little for me to keep interested, but I’ve worked out all the kinks.
Now – once I have the story, there is the next matter of pacing. What I usually do, and there is where I do use AI, is that I tell AI my entire story, as a short story – usually about 2 to 3 thousand words. Just the gist of it. I then tell it to give it back to me and break it up into X amount of chapters, which it does. I can then use this chapters as a rough guide while I’m writing.
So, now that I’ve told you the rough idea, let me know you what is happening.
Currently, The Second Earth is with my proofer. I have gotten it back from the printer and it looks good. I wish I had taken a photo when I saw it, but not to worry, I’ll get it back next week sometime and share.
The current book I am working on – Echoes of Emberwood – I’m in the midst of writing. This will be the longest book I’ve written (don’t be fooled by the 65K there – that’s just Part One) and I’m a little in two minds about whether to make it really something spectacular, like a giant hardcopy (Rob Hobb comes to mind), or if I should break it up into smaller books, for paperback. I know that from a marketing perspective, the smaller paperback’s are better, as the hardcopy will be expensive.
But – it’s just be and I’m an indie, so I might just do what I want, and have the hardcopy!
Right now, though, I’m still under ten thousand words. It’s a little bit of a push because I’m tired this week. You’ll see in the shot of my photo above that my goal for this book is in Jan. I’m giving myself time, as we all know what the end of the year is like.
Then the last bit of news I have for you, is that, after some thinking, I’ve kind of worked out a way to do a book trailer for Second Earth.
I didn’t think I would be able to as that a visual might ruin it, but I thought of an angle that I could do. Giving the limitations, I thought I did an OK job. Feel free to pop me a like for being resourceful!
And that’s it!
Once the proof is back of Second Earth, I’ll be able to make those changes and then make the book go live.
As for Bloodlines and Rust – distribution was rejected again, due to the text being too close to the spine. Why they couldn’t tell me when they mentioned the other issue, I have no idea.
I’ll have to order another proof copy, but I’ll do that when Second Earth is finished and then I only have to pay for the one courier cost.
That’s it! For real this time.
I’ll tell you all about Echoes of Emberwoods story line soon, now that I’ve put finger to keyboard.
Fireborn Press 