Writing - part x778, Writing a Novel, Protagonist in the Initial Scene, Naturally Good, Reflected vs. Real

23 February 2019, Writing - part x778, Writing a Novel, Protagonist in the Initial Scene, Naturally Good, Reflected vs. Real

Announcement: Delay, my new novels can be seen on the internet, but my primary publisher has gone out of business—they couldn’t succeed in the past business and publishing environment.  I'll keep you informed, but I need a new publisher.  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 29^th novel, working title, Detective, potential title Blue Rose: Enchantment and the Detective.  The theme statement is: 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.  

Here is the cover proposal for Blue Rose: Enchantment and the Detective. 

Cover Proposal

The most important scene in any novel is the initial scene, but eventually, you have to move to the rising action. I am continuing to write on my 30^th novel, working title Red Sonja.  I finished my 29^th novel, working title Detective.  I’m planning to start on number 31, working title Shifter. 

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 30:  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 31:  Deirdre and Sorcha are redirected to French finishing school where they discover difficult mysteries, people, and events. 

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

          

Today:  Why don’t we go back to the basics and just writing a novel?  I can tell you what I do, and show you how I go about putting a novel together.  We can start with developing an idea then move into the details of the writing. 

To start a novel, I picture an initial scene.  I may start from a protagonist or just launch into mental development of an initial scene.  I get the idea for an initial scene from all kinds of sources.  To help get the creative juices flowing, let’s look at the initial scene. 

1.     Meeting between the protagonist and the antagonist or the protagonist’s helper

2.     Action point in the plot

3.     Buildup to an exciting scene

4.     Indirect introduction of the protagonist

The protagonist is the novel and the initial scene.  If you look at the four basic types of initial scenes, you see the reflection of the protagonist in each one.  If you noticed my examples yesterday, I expressed the scene idea, but none were completely independent of the protagonist.  Indeed, in most cases, I get an idea with a protagonist.  The protagonist is incomplete, but a sketch to begin with.  You can start with a protagonist, but in my opinion, as we see above, the protagonist is never completely independent from the initial scene.  As the ideas above imply, we can start with the characters, specifically the protagonist, antagonist or protagonist’s helper, and develop an initial scene. 

If we start with a protagonist, we need some kind of guide.  Here is a general guide for developing a modern protagonist.  We’ll look at examples and explain the ideas.

1.        Normal person (not wealthy, noble, or privileged)

2.      Loves to read

3.      Loves to learn

4.     Unique skill(s), power(s) and/or learning

5.      Pathos (poor, homeless, abused, friendless, ill)

6.     Individualistic and independent

7.      Introspective

8.     Leader

9.     Naturally good

10.  Rejection of the urban

11.   Rejection of the modern

12.  Appeal to the imagination

A romantic protagonist is naturally good.  The Romantic ideology is that children and innocents are perfect and pure just like nature and the natural is perfect and pure.  Romantic protagonists have religious leanings, but they worship on their own terms.  This comes directly out of existentialism and evangelism. 

I’ve written about a real vs. reflected worldviews before.  What happens when they get confused?  Some, especially Victorian, readers might imagine that Dracula is real.  We would call it reflective because Dracula reflects a worldview that is not real, but that is based in previous human myth.  However, this is how a real and reflected worldview get confused and why the reflected worldview is so powerful.

I can’t confuse a future worldview with real or reflected.  The future worldview is completely made up.  It is possible to confuse a created worldview with either reflected or real.  Harry Potty is exactly this kind of worldview.  Although the author of Harry Potty borrowed some real and reflected worldview features, her worldview is largely created.  The real and interesting problem is that Rawling selected pieces of the real and reflected to pull into her created worldview.  If you wondered what is wrong with her worldview and novels, this is it.  She completely ignores many of the most important features of the real and reflected world, like religion, to build her novel worldview.  With a church on almost every corner in Britain plus calls to prayer in most cities, how can she even contemplate a world without churches or religion? 

Another example is The Book Thief.  I haven’t read the book, but the movie is a real worldview that completely ignores the most important thing to the German people, their religion.  The addition of Christianity to The Book Thief would have significantly improved a good movie and made it actually believable.  Any movie about Nazi Germany domestic lives in World War II without any religion is more fictitious than any fantasy ever written.  If you remember, the murder of eight million Jews was a cornerstone of the history of Nazi Germany.  This was not caused by Christianity, but it was a feature of Nazi paganism and misguided Christian bigotry.  Catholicism and Lutheranism both share the brunt of not defending the Jews or opposing the Nazis until they themselves were persecuted.  The Book Thief purports to show the real state of the German people, yet it is only a pale reflection without any meaning because it ignores the most important idea, that of religion in the German state. 

What I’m trying to tell you is this—make sure you fully reflect the real or the reflected.  Ensure your created worldview matches something in the real, especially the pieces of the real that build it up.  You can have a reflected or real worldview that doesn’t include any religion, but you better not include anything spiritual that is either real or reflected.  Further, you better be set in a Western nation after about 1970 if you don’t include religion.  That might even be difficult.  If you haven’t noticed, most of the world’s violence and conflict since the fall of Soviet Communism has been against religions or by religions against both the religions and the non-religious.  What I’m telling you is to weight the real and reflected to produce something that seems real.  Harry Potty may be entertaining, but it certainly has very little touch of reality.

What does all this have to do with the naturally good romantic protagonist?  The Victorian and earlier writer had no problem interjecting the real or the reflected worldview.  Their worldview was really what people understood and believed.  The Romantic worldview, real, reflected, or created, can include all kinds of elements the Victorians never imagined, but it can also hide elements it doesn’t like or that it simply wants to ignore.  I think ignoring human problems and truth is not ever a way to tackle and understand them.  Children and adults who have reached a level of reading comprehension understand this too.  That’s why they turn to Victorian novels for the core strength of complexity and reality that is missing in many modern novels.  Romantic novels and protagonists can handle many problems Victorian and realistic novels can’t, but only if the Romantic novels are willing to actually cover these important subjects or truths.  The purpose of all novels is to entertain, but you can’t entertain people if they can’t see the real world as a layer under the worldview of the novel.

The naturally good protagonist is the current worldview of the Western World.  It is an underpinning of Western culture and society, but that worldview brings baggage with it that requires some understanding and examination.  As I noted and C.S. Lewis writes, you can’t introduce the spiritual without bringing in God, religion, or at least the import of the spiritual in the world.  You really can’t bring up a real or reflected worldview that doesn’t somehow include the spiritual dimensions of humanity.  As a final note, you do see this in most modern movies—the West tends to ignore religion and the spiritual (until magic comes in), but the moment you move to the Middle East, you are suddenly confronted with religion, it becomes a key point in every setting.  Funny how one side of the world ignores religion and the spiritual and the other can’t help display it.  Novels need to reflect the real worldview and real ideas and problems not just made up ones.                    

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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