23 July 2020, Writing - part xx294
Writing a Novel, more Mixed Redemption Plots
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 websites 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 29th 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 30th novel, working
title Red Sonja. I finished my 29th 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
Ideas. We need ideas. Ideas allow us to figure out the protagonist
and the telic flaw. Ideas don’t come
fully armed from the mind of Zeus. We
need to cultivate ideas.
1.
Read novels.
2.
Fill your mind with good
stuff—basically the stuff you want to write about.
3.
Figure out what will build ideas in
your mind and what will kill ideas in your mind.
4.
Study.
5.
Teach.
6.
Make the catharsis.
7.
Write.
The development of ideas is based on
study and research, but it is also based on creativity. Creativity is the extrapolation of older
ideas to form new ones or to present old ideas in a new form. It is a reflection of something new created
with ties to the history, science, and logic (the intellect). Creativity requires consuming, thinking, and
producing.
If we have filled our mind with all
kinds of information and ideas, we are ready to become creative. Creativity means the extrapolation of older
ideas to form new ones or to present old ideas in a new form. Literally, we are seeing the world in a new
way, or actually, we are seeing some part of the world in a new way.
I’ve worked through creativity and
the protagonist. The ultimate point is
that if you properly develop your protagonist, you have created your
novel. This moves us on to plots and
initial scenes. As I noted, if you have
a protagonist, you have a novel. The
reason is that a protagonist comes with a telic flaw, and a telic flaw provides
a plot and theme. If you have a
protagonist, that gives you a telic flaw, a plot, and a theme. I will also argue this gives you an initial
scene as well.
So, we worked extensively on the
protagonist. I gave you many examples
great, bad, and average. Most of these
were from classics, but I also used my own novels and protagonists as
examples. Here’s my plan.
1.
The protagonist comes with a telic flaw – the telic flaw
isn’t necessarily a flaw in the protagonist, but rather a flaw in the world of
the protagonist that only the Romantic protagonist can resolve.
2.
The telic flaw determines the plot.
3.
The telic flaw determines the theme.
4.
The telic flaw and the protagonist
determines the initial scene.
5.
The protagonist and the telic flaw
determines the initial setting.
6.
Plot examples from great classic
plots.
7.
Plot examples from mediocre classic plots.
8.
Plot examples from my novels.
9.
Creativity and the telic flaw and
plots.
10. Writer’s block as a problem of continuing the plot.
Every great or good protagonist
comes with their own telic flaw. I
showed how this worked with my own writing and novels. Let’s go over it in terms of the plot.
This is all about the telic
flaw. Every protagonist and every novel
must come with a telic flaw. They are
the same telic flaw. That telic flaw can
be external, internal or both.
We found that a self-discovery telic
flaw or a personal success telic flaw can potentially take a generic plot. We should be able to get an idea for the plot
purely from the protagonist, telic flaw and setting. All of these are interlaced and bring us our
plot.
For a great plot, the resolution of
the telic flaw has to be a surprise to the protagonist and to the reader. This is both the measure and the goal. As I noted before, for a great plot, the
author needs to make the telic flaw resolution appear to be impossible, but
then it happens. There is much more to
this.
Most modern novels are redemption
plots where the redemption is a mixture of physical and mental redemption. Usually the protagonist fixes something in
their own life that results in some type of physical resolution.
I’d say that every author strives to
write a mixed redemption plot—not all succeed.
We can see in Harry Potty, there is an obvious physical redemption in
every novel. This physical redemption is
generally against evil and specifically against the incarnation of the
antagonist in every novel. I’d almost
assert that Harry Potty isn’t a redemption plot at all—the redemption isn’t
really a recovery from one state to another as much as it is a defeat of a
person or being. This is more of a
detective plot than a redemption plot.
In a detective plot, the protagonist resolves a mystery or
captures/defeats a criminal. In a
redemption plot, the protagonist recovers or gains something precious. On the other hand, the author was either
advised to or attempted to develop Harry Potty into an emotional redemption plot. That’s why the later books get all
adolescently screwy with Harry hurting his friends more than his enemies. Plus, ultimately, Harry Potty is a Messiah
plot with an end of the world theme, but I think you can see enough redemption
elements in it—some added, some natural.
The sparkly vampires are definitely
a reverse redemption plot. They seek to
turn a very interesting reverse redemption plot into a psychological redemption
plot, and they are somewhat successful. It
is interesting cheering for vampires, but that is what you do in this
novel. It really is a reverse redemption
plot. The protagonist seeks to lose her
humanity to become a classic monster. In
writing terms this is a great means of turning an idea into a bestseller. If you remember, I wrote before about the
characteristics of great writing. One of
them was taking an old idea and turning it into something new, or taking an old
idea and inverting it. In the case of
the sparkly vampires, the author has taken an old idea, monsters, and turned
them into a near positive. Harry Potty
has done something similar. Other
authors have tried this approach with varying degrees of success. Most of the popular ones have made
bestsellers.
The sparkly vampires are a reverse
redemption plot because the protagonist’s telic flaw is that she wants to be a
monster. No matter how you look at it, she
seeks the opposite of redemption. It
does not good to wrap this in a nice wrapper with a bow, the end point is the protagonist
seeks both physical and mental degradation.
It ends up a bestseller, and I’m not certain it’s the best message for
the youth, but it is a bestseller.
Turning plots around to make great
stories is what writing is all about.
The Hungry Games is a classic type of redemption plot. It has characteristics of many of the
Victorian Era French Revolution set novels.
The redemption is gaining freedom from oppression. The author very successfully turns this into
an emotional and mental redemption plot.
Except the protagonist loses. The
antagonist of this novel is the state personified by the president of the
state. The protagonist is placed in the
position of fighting her allies to defeat the antagonist. This is another great plot idea, but one that
results in the exact opposite of a redemption plot. The overall novel is a redemption plot, but
the protagonist must act completely immorally and unethically to achieve this
redemption. Hey, it’s a best seller, but
look at the message.
Perhaps this is the problem with many
of us authors today, we can’t see killing other allied human beings as a good
means of progressing a redemption plot.
The immoral or amoral character of many of the dystopian novels is
pretty obvious today. It’s like the
false trope about the people in the lifeboat, and who they should kill and eat. The moral and human answer is always, we are
human beings, we don’t ever eat other human beings and we certainly don’t
murder them for our food. When a
societies moral underpinnings are based on inhuman reasoning, there are indeed consequences.
I don’t know if this is giving you
ideas or making you feel uncomfortable.
Almost all modern novels attempt a redemption plot and/or theme. Most of them attempt a mixed emotional and
physical redemption plot. Even some that
are obviously not redemption plots attempt some degree of redemption plot. Many popular novels are reverse redemption
plots. I’m not into Gandhi plots, but
immoral and reverse redemption plots are certainly not my bag. I’m not at all adverse to war or conflict
plots. You can see Hungry Games starts
as a redemption plot and moves to a conflict plot, but a conflict plot that
pits the protagonist against her allies or requires her to murder her own
people is a totally different kind of plot than a redemption plot. There is no redemption in murder or
betrayal. For a great example of a
redemption plot in this regard see Dune. Perhaps Dune
is a great example to look at. It is a
Messiah plot with a War plot component.
It really doesn’t mix in much of a redemption plot although the protagonist
is attempting to justify his mother’s actions and his own existence. Dune it
is. Perhaps we are moving to other types
of plots and mixed plots.
In any case, lest start with the
idea of an internal and external telic flaw.
Then let’s provide it a wrapper.
The wrapper is the plot.
The beginning of creativity is study
and effort. We can use this to
extrapolate to creativity. In addition,
we need to look at recording ideas and working with ideas.
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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