New Month And Freezing Cold

First day of February, and the temperature has dipped.   You can feel the chill against your bones, and apparently things will get worse at the weekend.   

Recently, I read through viewpoint sections of Dark Whispers, the first ever novel I wrote (the one I felt just didn’t come alive for me in the way I’d hope), and I can see certain parallels with some of my earlier photo shoots.   When I was editing the shots in Google’s Picasa, I tended to bring out the colors and emphasise contrast – but I can see now that the photographs would probably have benefited from less color/saturation.  I think the idea extends to the writing too, especially in Dark Whispers, that first problematic novel that never seemed to work, no matter what changes I made.   The tone of the writing, I suspect, contained too much “color”, when it needed less. 

I think the choice of subject matter didn’t necessarily help.  The other novel tended to have an otherworldly feel and contained classic whodunnit clichés: the village, the vulnerable (possibly paranoid) wife, rhymes, etc.  When a writer paints a picture like this, s/he often has nowhere else to take the story because the story has a tight but limited focus preventing further plot and character development.  However, when I worked on my debut novel (Secrets by Lawrence Estrey), I ditched about two-thirds of original material and began almost entirely from scratch, resetting it in a different part of the country (no more villages) and concentrating on varying degrees of crime.  Suddenly, I had plenty of places to take the story and ways of broadening the central characters, plus better ideas of how to make sections truly chilling. 

I’m currently working on a new crime thriller set in Manchester and the central characters have already begun to make an impact on me.

Read Full Post »

Another Bout Of Writer’s Block – Again!

Once more, I’m struggling with the plot in my latest novel, a psychological thriller, unsure of where to go or which path to take…

Read Full Post »

Deep Into The Plot, Second Novel

Once more, I’m revising the plot of my second novel, a psychological thriller set in the north of England, UK.   I finished the rewrite about three weeks ago and am fairly satisfied with the overall plot. A case, now, of how best to present it.

Read Full Post »

Novel Writing: Cropping The Story

Digital photography enables people to crop photos using photo editing software.  The photographer will look at a photo, decide which part of the photo they’d like to display and cut the rest.  Certainly, I do.  All the time.

I think cropping can be applied to story telling.  Often, writers will have more than one central idea.  A combination of story ideas may work well in some novels, but not in others.  It may leave readers asking, whose story?

For a long time, my second novel, a psychological thriller, focused on two protagonists, but this led to clutter and confusion in places, and I had to decide to crop the novel and choose only one protagonist, developing the story along a single route. This meant eradicating large section of the former story.  Basically, it meant rewriting much of it and using only one plotline.  However, cutting most of the material has resulted in many new scenes and opportunities to take the story further. 

Early days, but I’m enjoying the process.

Read Full Post »

Novel Writing: What’s The Story Really About?

At the moment, I’m churning out more than 1000 words a day of my second novel, a psychological thriller.  I wouldn’t call the work easy, but I certainly wouldn’t describe it as frustrating – rather, challenging and rewarding.  In the past, however, the writing hasn’t always come quickly. Recently, in fact, I’ve thought a lot about previous drafts of my two novels, particularly the problematic areas in the stories. 

The biggest obstacle to story telling, I suspect, lies in not knowing what the story is really about.  Story telling is fundamentally about people.  Character.  What motivates a character. Their most powerful desires, their greatest fears.

But characters don’t exist in isolation. They interact with other characters. One character might behave unfavourably to another. The character in question might plan their actions with a goal in mind.  Revenge.  Greed. 

Alternatively, a character might seek to protect or rescue another character. Those characters – “the goodies” – will also need a plan of action.

Will the character achieve their goal?   The three possible answers are Yes, No and Don’t Know (open endings).

The central story question forms the basis of the plot.  Character-led plot drives the story on. Obstacles threaten to prevent the central character’s aims.  In thriller and crime novels, the danger often mounts.  If not, the descent into emotional mayhem may intensify.

What’s the best way of telling the story on paper?   This is where structure comes in.  Viewpoint consideration.   Chapter lengths.  Whether to divide the novel into sections. Whether to incorporate back story or memory flashbacks.  What to concentrate on.  In thriller and crime novels, the writer has a number of options.  The forensic set up. The current investigation. The effects of the crime on the people involved.  The character interactions. In my novels, I concentrate mostly on how an event has impacted the lives of others and how those characters relate to one another.  

Finally, theme. What the story is really about.  The point the author is hoping to make through their writing. 

Just a few of my thoughts.

Read Full Post »

Novel Writing: Is The Story Believable?

A question I often ask myself – does a particular section ring true? 

Sometimes it does, but not always.  I think it boils down to the relationship between the writer and their story – i.e. does the writer fully believe in the story they’re telling?  Or do they suspect that a story question doesn’t really work (but continue with it anyway)?

One way of testing an idea is to see how clearly you can visualise the details, especially in relation to the timing and the characters involved.   Events have to occur in a logical framework, even those that arise from spontaneity or rash decision making.   Character (individual motives, aspirations and fears) always determines plot, even when the overall emphasis is on plot.  After all, a plot can’t exist without the characters driving the story forward.

Another issue concerns theme and purpose.  What is the purpose of the scene in question?  What point am I trying to make by including this section in the drama?  Would the story work without the scene?

As a writer who writes every day, I ask myself these questions on a regular basis. I have found that writer’s block usually affects me when I don’t fully understand why I’m working on a scene.  

Just a few of my thoughts.

Read Full Post »

Novel Writing and Crime Genre: A Not-So-Nice Plot

After nearly two months of revision on the first third of my second novel, a crime/psychological thriller, I’ve come to an uncomfortable conclusion – that the crime in the story must be particularly shocking in order for  the novel to work.   I’ve tended to shy away from this and resort to more old-fashioned or “otherworldly” plots, but none of those plots have convinced me yet.  I think the first eight chapters as they currently stand read well; my struggles revolve around what happens next.  Future chapters, I feel, will need a back story plot that reflects the seriousness of the issues raised in earlier chapters.

Read Full Post »

Novel Writing: Tell The Story You Want To Tell

From as far back as I can remember, I’ve always loved concocting scenarios.  Indeed, I constantly told harmless tales when I was a child.  Lies, yes, but not serious ones.  (Although I’ve told a few big lies as well over the years and managed to keep a straight face!)

Some years ago, I decided to try my hand at writing a novel, a psychological thriller.  When I began the project, I relied on gut feeling.  Hence, my main character got frightened early on in the story, but soon stood up for herself, for I sensed that characters should fight back and not become too passive. Then came the local writing group and all the various “rules,” and my writing soon lost focus, due in part to that awful phrase “Show, Don’t Tell.”  From that point on, I concentrated  on “showing” and producing a good writing style, and ended up missing the whole point of the writing: the story.

When I met the editor last December, she wouldn’t give me a detailed critique of my first novel.  Instead, she told me to look to myself for the answers – which, hopefully, I have done.  I’ve spent the last three months delving deep into the central character of both novels and examining the plots in detail so that each plot is believable in terms of forensic investigation.  At the same time, I’ve taken an intuitive view and asked myself what it is I really wish to convey. What issues do I feel passionate about?  What scenes can I easily envisage?  How do these scenes affect the lives and the emotions of the central characters?

At times, I’ve discovered answers I hadn’t originally considered, but I feel the writing has taken on a new quality – shape and structure.

Read Full Post »

Themes And Viewpoint In Novel Writing

I have finished revising my first novel, a psychological thriller set in the English countryside, and am waiting to hear when I can send it back to the editor.   The revision process took just under three months and proved less difficult than I’d anticipated.

The novel complete, I now have some time on my hands, but I can rarely go through a day without doing some creative writing, so this evening I took a look at the first twelve chapters of my third novel, another psychological thriller.  A few months ago, a local novelist group read some of the chapters of the third novel and commented favourably on the writing style but not the plot.  Having carefully read through the material this evening and made notes, I would say that the writing style and plot are not yet up to standard, although a couple of the scenes really chilled me.  The plot itself doesn’t ring true at this stage.

As I read, I concentrated on themes and story questions, composing a basic structure that I think could work, especially with rotating viewpoints to develop atmosphere.   I’ve always liked working with more than one viewpoint to allow one perspective to complement another.   Recording the relevant story questions is crucial too, as having a clear list of areas to address helps the draft stay focused.  I recommend the novel writing software Storybook, an open source package that can be downloaded for free. Storybook enables writers to work in scenes with various theme strand charts, crucial for the novel’s structure.

Read Full Post »

The Novel Rewrite

I’m 23,000 words into the rewrite of a psychological thriller dealing with family secrets, a serious crime and a wealthy man with gangster connections. The writing’s going well, I think, but I’m finding elements of the revision hard going.  In particular, I’m finally having to address structural problems that I’ve generally tended to avoid up till now.

During a recent meeting with an editor, several points emerged:

1. Readers might have difficulty identifying with the central character, as the character is never really developed in the present;
2. A significant degree of confusion over two major male characters; 
3. The central character makes certain assumptions without valid reason;
4. Authorial voice interrupts viewpoint narratives on occasion;
5. The central character needs to react to the rising danger in more realistic ways.

There were also promising aspects of the work.  

 

_______

At present, I’m concentrating on:

1. Building up more thorough images of significant characters;
2. Increasing the information experienced through the senses, such as sounds, music, specific smells, etc;
3. Delaying the central character’s rising paranoia until much later in the story;
4. Holding back on some of the central character’s childhood memories, background information and back stories;
5. Finding more sophisticated ways of dealing with memory throughout;
6. Working in scenes rather than chapters;
7. Spending several days at a time reworking the scenes before printing them out;
8. Allowing the plot to unfold gradually;
9. Making sure that each incident and plot development reveals something new.

Read Full Post »