Writing Ideas - New Novel, part x136, It’s Finished, Publication

22 May 2017, Writing Ideas - New Novel, part x136, It’s Finished, Publication

Announcement: Delay, my new novels can be seen on the internet, but the publisher has delayed all their fiction output due to the economy.  I'll keep you informed.  More 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.

Today's Blog: To see the steps in the publication process, visit my writing website http://www.ldalford.com/ and select "production schedule," you will be sent to http://www.sisteroflight.com/.

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.

     4a. Show what can be seen, heard, felt, smelled, and tasted on the stage of the novel.

5. Immerse yourself in the world of your writing.

These are the steps I use to write a novel including the five discrete parts of a novel:

 

1.      Design the initial scene

2.      Develop a theme statement (initial setting, protagonist, protagonist’s helper or antagonist, action statement)

a.       Research as required

b.      Develop the initial setting

c.       Develop the characters

d.      Identify the telic flaw (internal and external)

3.      Write the initial scene (identify the output: implied setting, implied characters, implied action movement)

4.      Write the next scene(s) to the climax (rising action)

5.      Write the climax scene

6.      Write the falling action scene(s)

7.      Write the dénouement scene

I finished writing my 27^th novel, working title, Claire, potential title Sorcha: Enchantment and the Curse.  This might need some tweaking.  The theme statement is: Claire (Sorcha) Davis accepts Shiggy, a dangerous screw-up, into her Stela branch of the organization and rehabilitates her.  

Here is the cover proposal for Sorcha: Enchantment and the Curse. 

Cover Proposal

The most important scene in any novel is the initial scene, but eventually, you have to move to the rising action. I started writing my 28^th novel, working title Red Sonja.  I finished my 29^th novel, working title School.  I’ll be providing information on the marketing materials and editing.

How to begin a novel.  Number one thought, we need an entertaining idea.  I usually encapsulate such an idea with a theme statement.  Since I’m writing a new novel, we need a new theme statement.  Here is an initial cut.

 

For novel 28:  Red Sonja, a Soviet spy, infiltrates the X-plane programs at Edwards AFB as a test pilot’s administrative clerk, learns about freedom, and is redeemed.

 

For novel 29:  Sorcha, the abandoned child of an Unseelie and a human, secretly attends Wycombe Abbey girls’ school where she meets the problem child Deirdre and is redeemed.

 

I write to entertain and I hope you do to.  The steps in my editing and preparation phases is to prepare my documents to present to publishers.  Once I’ve gone through the stages of editing I mentioned, one of the most important and near end stage is to present my manuscript to my prepublication editors/readers.  When I have a novel ready for publication, I can get quite a few readers/editors.  In general, at that stage, I am using the text from the publisher’s editor for the material.  There are always issues to find, but the most important are the actual story and plot.  This is what I’m looking for from my readers/editors.

 

My first reader is one of my best critics.  As I noted before, except for unique and special cases, I always take all the suggestions from my readers/editors.  The ones I will exclude are from readers who obviously don’t like my writing.  There are creative and constructive comments that can be feasibly approached in the writing, but a reader who literally just doesn’t care for the plot, your writing style, or the subject matter of the novel, is someone you can’t please.  Constructive criticism can be incorporated any time, and always should be addressed in some way.

 

As I noted, I send the competed and formatted work in an editable document to my main reader to get their impressions.  They usually will provide me with edits as well, but I’m mainly looking for overall feedback.  I do like to get strong criticism that I can act on.  Directed criticism is very helpful.  For example, this part or idea isn’t logical because, or I didn’t like that character because, or the plot doesn’t make sense to me here because.  I even like less constructive feedback such as, this didn’t seem reasonable to me, or the character just seemed nasty here, or this didn’t seem reasonable here.  In the case of the first, there are reasons “because.”  In the second example, no reasons, but a location.  Editing is nice, but better than editing is what the like or don’t like about the novel.  You can use this to improve your novel.   

 

More tomorrow.

For more information, you can visit my author site http://www.ldalford.com/, and my individual novel websites:

http://www.ancientlight.com/
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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