Writing - part x886, Writing a Novel, Changing World and Other Stuff

11 June 2019, Writing - part x886, Writing a Novel, Changing World and Other Stuff

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 s 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. 

Let’s look at a subject that is really ignored in the modern era.  I’m not certain how much this can help your current writing.  I would argue that theoretically, this subject can really help those who write historical and futuristic fiction.  It depends on how your write your historical and futuristic fiction.  There are two ways to write historical fiction—let’s look at this.

The first and most common way to write historical fiction is to write a novel that projects modern ideas and history as historical ideas and history.  In other words to present modern ideas and historical ideas as the same.  I think this is perhaps the most egregious and perverse means of presenting a false view of history.  The author is either completely ignorant of the past, is intentionally attempting to education people in a false view of history, or both.  The real historical world is very different both culturally and socially from our current world.  The true author attempts to convey this in historical writing.

The second and less common means of historical writing is to actually incorporate the past into a novel to convey the actual way people thought and acted in the past.  This approach actually goes back into time to give a complete view of the way the people thought and acted.  To this end, let’s look at how the world changed and how people thought in the past.  This is more of a historical look at the world for the purpose of understanding how the world worked in the past and how people thought and acted.  We’ll use historical information to see what concerned affected their lives. Here is a list of potential issues.  We’ll look at them in detail:

1.   Vocabulary

2.   Ideas

3.   Social construction

4.   Culture

5.   Politics

6.   History

7.   Language

8.   Common knowledge

9.   Common sense

10. Reflected culture

11. Reflected history

12. Reflected society

13. Truth

14. Food

15. Money

16. Weapons and warfare

17. Transportation

18. Communication

19. Writing 

Food in history is one of my most favorite topics.  The reason is that most people have no clue.  We all assume the worldview of our event horizon.  The real world of food—that is what people ate is a significant marker in human history.  Why can’t the writers get it right?

With a cutting tool, fire, non-fire safe containers, ovens, a mortar and pestle, a heat safe pot and a metal pot, I can make just about every kind of modern and ancient cooked food.

What’s the big deal?  The when in time, the where in the world, and the who (as in wealth and power) completely defines what people could and did eat.  Until about 1750, the average person would only be able to eat certain foods like soups or gruels in a pub.  It is really difficult to determine when certain societies and cultures actually had some of these inventions available for food production and cooking.  In my opinion as a historian, you should go toward not available or at least make a remark if they were available.  This is especially important prior to that date 1750, and even then, unless your protagonist or characters are wealthy, metal especially for food cooking was not universally available. 

To put this into perspective, it is very likely that people could have eaten much more often in the ancient world at pubs because pubs would have the ability to procure and use all the tools of food preparation.  This is important, because modern people naturally presume that most people in antiquity and in normal history (1 to 1750 AD) ate at home.  In many cases, especially if they were wealthy or isolated, they did.  However, even in near history, we see wealthy families as members of clubs and eating at these clubs.  This began to happen at the turn of the 20^th Century when the middle class expanded and could afford fewer cooks and servants.  However, there is also a possibility that before 1750, people would commonly eat a pubs to acquire the types of food only pubs and the wealthy could produce.

If you remember all cultures before the modern era were starvation cultures, you can see why a pub with the ability to produce soups, breads, gruel, and other good and hearty food would become the center of a community.  This is especially true when only the pub (and the squire) had a pot to cook with.

This might explain why all the accounts we have that talk about it express the commonality of pubs.  In archeology, we see pubs in the center of every town.  We assume this means people liked to gather for conviviality and drinking (alcoholic beverages), but what if the reason wasn’t the alcohol as much as the availability of better food.

You see how this works, right?  I can have all the raw ingredients in my possession, but unless I can properly prepare and cook it, the food is just raw food.  In a starvation culture proper cooking might mean the difference between life and death.  Think about the availability of food by season and the ability to prepare it especially when it has been preserved.  If you realize how important preparation and availability is to survival, you can see why people would want to leave food preparation to experts. 

This becomes more important when you recognize that there are no cookbooks.  There are no measuring devices.  There are only recipes learned by rote and passed down through generations.  If food is such a precious commodity, how do I teach a person to cook properly?  You can’t do this without waste.  Waste means someone goes hungry. 

Perhaps this is the most important point we need to realize in history.  People in the past were mostly hungry all the time.  They didn’t have much food, and the food they had was only palatable if it was properly prepared.  I try to convey this in my novels.  

There are two ways we can go from here.  One direction is to explain how cooking and food improved over time past antiquity.  The other is to explain how we got out of a starvation culture.  Out of a starvation culture leads to money.  That might be the way to go.  

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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