Announcement: My new novels should be available from any webseller or can be ordered from any brick and mortar bookstore. Information can be found at www.ancientlight.com. Check out my novels--I think you'll really enjoy them.
Introduction: I wrote the novel Aksinya: Enchantment and the Daemon. This was my 21st novel and through this blog, I gave you the entire novel in installments that included commentary on the writing. In the commentary, in addition to other general information on writing, I explained, how the novel was constructed, the metaphors and symbols in it, the writing techniques and tricks I used, and the way I built the scenes. You can look back through this blog and read the entire novel beginning with http://www.pilotlion.blogspot.com/2010/10/new-novel-part-3-girl-and-demon.html.
I'm using this novel as an example of how I produce, market, and eventually (we hope) get a novel published. I'll keep you informed along the way.
The four plus one basic rules I employ when writing:
1. Don't confuse your readers.
2. Entertain your readers.
3. Ground your readers in the writing.
4. Don't show (or tell) everything.
5. Immerse yourself in the world of your writing.
All novels have five discrete parts:
1. The initial scene (the beginning)
2. The rising action
3. The climax
4. The falling action
5. The dénouement
The theme statement of my 25th novel, working title, Escape, is this: a girl in a fascist island nation will do anything to escape--a young cargo ferry pilot not following the rules crashes on the island.
This theme statement lends itself well to each part of the development of a novel. Note, there is a setting, an initial scene, protagonist, protagonist helper, antagonist, and the climax is obvious. Let's talk about each.
More small digression: I'm now on a demo tour in the AT-6 to Paraguay. I'm writing from Paraguay.
I mentioned that I like to let a novel write itself. The point of this is not to force the writing in one way or another, but to build the world from the setting. The details come out of the writing itself.
What I mean by writing itself is that I provide the theme, plot, setting, and characters then let them act in the storyline to develop the climax. The spaceship (shuttle) is only one example of this. Here is another more specific example--it comes out of the question of what do the people in my new book, Escape do for books and other related materials.
The answer is electronics. The world of Freedom (the island fascist nation in the book), does not include books at all for the citizens--only the Party Members have books. I haven't come to the point were I need to describe them yet, but I suspect I will leave the books of Freedom as mostly picture books in a paper or plastic format and not electronic. There are reasons based on the setting--of course.
Freedom is an odd mix of technology and lack of technology. As I've written in this blog, when extrapolating the future, autocratic nations without strong markets and wealthy people tend to have very few technological advances--they stagnate technologically. A strong market and wealthy are required for fast technology increases. Therefore, Freedom can be expected to have only the technology that was prominent at the time of its creation while the other nations around it have progressed beyond it. Freedom therefore has no electronic books except reference manuals in the computers. They don't have electronic books. The citizens of Freedom don't have access to books anyway. As my protagonist, Reb tells Scott: read every word--here they skip over the ones they don't know or that they want you to not know. One of the powerful concepts I use is the pictures and words in Scott's (protagonist's helper) electronic books that interest and encourage Reb.
By the way, Merry second day of Christmas--this is my gift to you: more about electronic boos and characters.
More tomorrow.
For more information, you can visit my author site http://www.ldalford.com/, and my individual novel websites:
http://www.aegyptnovel.com/
http://www.centurionnovel.com
http://www.thesecondmission.com/
http://www.theendofhonor.com/
http://www.thefoxshonor.com
http://www.aseasonofhonor.com
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