Tag: How to Write a Novel
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A New Beginning: Fall 2022 Newsletter
A New Beginning: Fall 2022 Newsletter A New Beginning to Die by the Sword aka To Die by the Sword aka Death in Shining Armor Night . . . Saturday, September 10, 1988 The Medieval Fair Site . . . I didn’t want much that night, just to go out to the shop on…
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April 2021 WiP Report
I hoped to report that I’ve finished my current Work-in-Progress, Apart in April, Book 5 of my Calendar Mystery series. But it’s not happening, partly because my characters keep talking to me as I write. One of them will say, “How about I do this?” Another might say, “I wouldn’t do that! Take it out!”…
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WiP Report January 2021
Last Friday, I finished what I hope will be the next-to-the-last draft of Book 5 of my Calendar Mystery series, set in Kansas City, a place that could get downright deadly a hundred years or so ago for a business girl named Minty Wilcox and a dashing detective named Daniel Price. (Just practicing my blurb…
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Novel Basics Card # 20
Novel Basics Card # 20 The Cover Card The Cover Card asks the question, “What’s my novel’s name?” The wise organizers of NaNoWriMo say that those who have covers for their projects before they start drafting them are 60% more likely to write it that those who don’t. I think possibly that simply giving your…
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Novel Basics Cards # 18 & 19
Novel Basics Card # 18 The Reader Card The Reader Card asks the question, “Who will read my novel?” By now, you probably have a fairly good idea of who will want to read your novel. For one thing, chances are good that your target or ideal reader reads the same sorts of novels as…
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Novel Basics Card # 17
Novel Basics Card # 17 The Genre Card The Genre Card asks the question, “What kind of a novel will I write?” Ordinarily, I don’t ascribe to the saying, “Write what you know” because when writers don’t know something they need to put in their books, they do research. But in this case, I advise…
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Novel Basics Card # 16
Novel Basics Card # 16 The Subplot Card The subplot card asks the question, “What else happens in my novel?” The novel is a huge beast and needs a lot of plot to reach the minimum required 40,000 words that will go into it. One way a writer often finds those words is with subplots.…
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Novel Basics Cards # 14 & 15
Card # 14, the First Set-up Scene Card asks the question, “What leads to Act 2 of my novel?” Near the end of Act 1 of your novel, after you’ve hooked your reader with the beginning scene and shown your protagonist and her world, you need a scene in which the protagonist commits to the…
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Novel Basics Cards # 12 & 13
Novel Basics: Card # 12 The Climax Card The Climax Scene Card asks the question, “What’s the high point of my novel’s plot?” Back when I taught Creative Writing at one of America’s top community colleges, often as I introduced the topic of the moment of the highest intensity of your plot, the part of…
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Novel Basics: Cards # 10 and # 11
Novel Basics: Card # 10 The First Scene Card (aka the Hook) The First Scene Card asks the question, “How will my novel start?” Entire books have been written on the importance of the start of your novel. I won’t list any of these books here. But I will say that, above all else, the…