19 January 2018, Writing - part
x378, Novel Form, A New Novel, Plot and Climax from the Initial Scene, Essie
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 28th novel, working title, School, potential
title Deirdre: Enchantment and the School. The theme statement is: 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.
Here is the cover proposal for Deirdre:
Enchantment and the School.
The most important scene in any
novel is the initial scene, but eventually, you have to move to the rising
action. I continued writing my 29th novel, working title Red Sonja. I finished my 28th novel, working
title School. If you noticed, I started on number 28, but
finished number 29 (in the starting sequence—it’s actually higher than
that). I adjusted the numbering. I do keep everything clear in my
records.
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 29: 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 30: Lady Azure Rose Wishart, the Chancellor of
the Fae, supernatural detective, and all around dangerous girl, finds love,
solves cases, breaks heads, and plays golf.
This
is the classical form for writing a successful 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 (protagonist,
antagonist, and optionally the protagonist’s helper)
d.
Identify the telic flaw of the
protagonist (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
The
protagonist and the telic flaw are tied permanently together. The novel plot is completely dependent on the
protagonist and the protagonist’s telic flaw.
They are inseparable. This is
likely the most critical concept about any normal (classical) form novel.
Here
are the parts of a normal (classical) novel:
1.
The Initial scene (identify the
output: implied setting, implied characters, implied action movement)
2.
The Rising action scenes
3.
The Climax scene
4.
The Falling action scene(s)
5.
The Dénouement scene
So,
how do you write a rich and powerful initial scene? Let’s start from a theme statement. Here is an example from my latest novel:
The
theme statement for Deirdre: Enchantment
and the School is: 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.
Here
is the scene development outline:
1.
Scene input (comes from the previous scene output or is an initial scene)
2.
Write the scene setting (place, time, stuff, and characters)
3.
Imagine the output, creative elements, plot, telic flaw resolution (climax) and
develop the tension and release.
4.
Write the scene using the output and creative elements to build the tension.
5.
Write the release
6.
Write the kicker
If
you have the characters (protagonist, protagonist’s helper, and antagonist),
the initial setting, the telic flaw (from the protagonist), a plot idea, the
theme action, then you are ready to write the initial scene. I would state that since you have a
protagonist, the telic flaw, a plot idea, and the theme action, you have about
everything—what you might be lacking is the tension and release cycle in your scenes.
With
a protagonist, a telic flaw, a theme statement, and an initial setting, I’m
ready to begin a novel. I’ll move to the
telic flaw for the novel. Since I am
going to provide the first chapter as a teaser any way, I might as well show
you the initial scene.
Here
is the theme statement as a reminder:
Lady
Azure Rose Wishart, the Chancellor of the Fae, supernatural detective, and all
around dangerous girl, finds love, solves cases, breaks heads, and plays golf.
With
a single scene—the initial scene (along with the characters, setting, and the
telic flaw), you have enough to write an entire novel. This was the wonderful discovery I made by
the time I wrote my eighth novel.
Let
me pass on some examples. My Aegypt (Ancient Light) novels were easy to write
using the way I described. That’s
because they all had a historical premise tied to historical events. The resolution and climax just fit into the
historical events. That’s part of the
power of writing and authorship. The
novels that were a little more problematic, but still easy, are my Enchantment
novels. Let me point out a little about
each one. I’ll continue with Essie:
Enchantment and the Aos Si.
Essie
is my delightful protagonist. In the
initial scene, Mrs. Lyons captures Essie in her pantry. Essie is naked, hungry, and dirty. You can guess the question, who is
Essie? Indeed this is the theme question
of the novel that drives the plot.
It
gets a little deeper than that, but I wanted to convey this scene and this
point as the first base in this novel.
Here is a little from the initial scene:
Mrs.
Lyons, actually, Matilda Anne Robina Acland Hastings Lyons, who happened to
once be married to Colonel Bruce Lyons, and who held onto the Mrs. and the
Lyons as mementos although the man was long dead, heard a crash in her
kitchen. She was a light sleeper anyway,
but the crash rang loud enough to wake the dead. She reached under her pillow for the
prototype Etan Arms AP-1 nine millimeter semi-automatic pistol she kept
there. She examined the sleek weapon, a
gift from her favorite adopted great grandchild, Leila, and returned it, with
the safety still on, to its hiding spot.
She
slipped out of the covers as quietly as a very old woman could and instead of
her pistol, picked up the heavy cane beside her bed. She constantly carried it, not because she
needed a cane, but because everyone expected her to carry one—she enjoyed the
privilege and the recognition. Mrs.
Lyons was very old, but not weak, demented, or non-mobile. She looked wrinkled and gray now, but didn’t
care a lick about appearance anymore.
She still looked thin and athletic—about as athletic as she always was,
which wasn’t very, but she could move as well if not better than a woman half
her age. So she imagined.
Mrs.
Lyons pulled her dressing gown over her nightgown and hefted her cane. She didn’t turn on any lights. Her vision was still good, and her eyesight
was already well adapted to the thick moonlight that shined outside her
windows. She walked through her open
doorway and down the hall toward the front of the house.
Her
country house was small, much smaller than the places she inhabited as a child,
a young woman, or a married woman. She
was now a widow, and a small cottage in the country seemed to suit her. The hallway led to a classic branch. To the right, lay the foyer and front
door. The foyer opened to a dining room
on the left and a parlor to the right.
To the left lay the servant’s quarters—none in use at the moment. In front of her ran a short hall to a phone
closet and a water closet—an odd combination to be sure. To the right of that short extension, lay the
dining room and to the left… the kitchen.
Mrs.
Lyons heard another peculiar bump and then a thump from inside her kitchen—she
strained to listen closer… or perhaps the sounds came from her pantry. She held up her cane like a baseball bat and
peeked around the opening into the kitchen.
She squinted in the darkness, but didn’t spot anything amiss.
She
heard another thump. Slurping sounds and
a slight growl followed it. Mrs. Lyons
wondered at that. The constable had
reported thefts of food and unusual break-ins across the shire, but they seemed
wholly of human origin. This
sounded…animal-like.
Mrs.
Lyons almost continued on to the phone closet to ring the constable’s post in
the village, but she realized no one would be on duty at this time of
night. She shrugged, and
soundlessly—well, as soundlessly as she could, stepped into the kitchen.
She
snuck around the cabinet side, where she knew none of the creaking boards would
betray her, and almost tripped over a light metal boiler on the floor. Her visitor must have knocked that from the
counter. With greater care, she slowly
slipped to the pantry door. The door
stood open—of course it did. She knew she
had shut it tight after making her evening tea.
Mrs.
Lyons brought her cane up in front of her, but with a slight cock for
leverage. She craned her neck around the
opening to the pantry and kept to the shadows so she wouldn’t be backlit from
the kitchen window. Only a thin slice of
the evening’s full moon shone through that window, and it lay to her side at
the back of the kitchen. She noted her
kitchen’s outside door stood fully open and that let in more light than the
lace covered window. That door was also
obviously how her little kitchen thief had entered.
Mrs.
Lyons hefted her cane again. She didn’t
intend to use it, except in defense, but she did want to catch her little
kitchen thief. The sounds of eating, not
pretty sounds at all, as well as growls rose out of the depths of the pantry. Mrs. Lyons smelled the baked ham she’d put up
for the weekend. She spotted other odds
and ends scattered on the shadowed floor of the pantry. That put her immediately into a more
indignant mood. She didn’t like thieves,
but she liked untidy thieves even less.
Mrs.
Lyons pitched her cane back a bit more for leverage and pressed her elbow
against the panty light switch. It was a
new switch and not the old twist type.
With a push of her wrinkled elbow, the switch moved, the light came on
with a fluorescent blink, and a startled cry emerged from the pantry.
Mrs. Lyons gasped. Her gasp sounded almost as loud as the
shocked yowl from inside her pantry. A
naked girl or young woman sat on the center counter and shielded her eyes. She was completely starkers and trailed half
of Mrs. Lyons’ baked ham from her mouth.
Mrs.
Lyons finds a young woman in her pantry.
The question is what is she going to do about it. I didn’t give you the capture of Essie, but I
assure you, she is captured. Now, Mrs.
Lyons must determine what to do about this feral young woman. The book is a revelation of Essie. If you do some research on the Aos Si, you
might begin to get the point of the novel, but there is more.
What
I love about novels is how they have a focus and a life of their own. A novel should never include anything that
doesn’t lead to the climax, but in a complex novel, many instances and events
point to the climax. This is what makes
characters and novels so fun. Like some
of my readers, I wish the novel could go on and on and on, but you have to cut
it off somewhere and that is the climax.
I
hope you can see that with a scene output, the plot of Essie can continue. The question of who is Essie leaps from the
initial scene. The answer is an entire
novel. I will say, the climax is a bit unusual—the
Queen is bitten and Essie escapes, but that is a fun and interesting plot.
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
http://www.aegyptnovel.com/
http://www.centurionnovel.com
http://www.thesecondmission.com/
http://www.theendofhonor.com/
http://www.thefoxshonor.com
http://www.aseasonofhonor.com
fiction, theme, plot, story, storyline, character development, scene, setting, conversation, novel, book, writing, information, study, marketing, tension, release, creative, idea, logic
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