05 August 2024, Writing - part xxx767 Forms of Novels, Standard, Initial Scene, more Setting Elements
Announcement: I still need a new
publisher.
However, I’ve taken the step to republish my previously published novels.
I’m starting with Centurion, and we’ll see from there. Since
previously published novels have little chance of publication in the market
(unless they are huge best sellers), I might as well get those older novels
back out. I’m going through Amazon Publishing, and I’ll pass the
information on to you.
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 two 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.
6. The initial scene is
the most important scene.
These are the steps I use
to write a novel including the five discrete parts of a novel:
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 31st novel,
working title, Cassandra, potential title Cassandra:
Enchantment and the Warriors. The theme statement is: Deirdre and
Sorcha are redirected to French finishing school where they discover difficult
mysteries, people, and events.
Here is the cover
proposal for the third edition of Centurion:
|
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 finished writing number 31,
working title Cassandra: Enchantment and the Warrior. I just
finished my 32nd novel and 33rd novel: Rose:
Enchantment and the Flower, and Seoirse: Enchantment and the
Assignment.
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 34: Seoirse is assigned to be Rose’s
protector and helper at Monmouth while Rose deals with five goddesses and
schoolwork; unfortunately, Seoirse has fallen in love with Rose.
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: Let me tell
you a little about writing. Writing isn’t so much a hobby, a career, or a
pastime. Writing is a habit and an obsession. We who love to write
love to write.
If you love to write, the
problem is gaining the skills to write well. We want to write well enough
to have others enjoy our writing. This is important. No one writes
just for themselves the idea is absolutely irrational and silly. I can
prove why.
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.
2. The rising action scenes
3. The climax scene
4. The falling action scene(s)
5. The dénouement scene(s)
The initial scene is the
most important scene and part of any novel. To get to the initial scene,
you don’t need a plot, you need a protagonist.
So, perhaps I should look at the form of the
novel and the reflected worldview. I’ll start simply with some
advice. Here is the form of the standard novel:
1. The initial scene
2. The rising action scenes
3. The climax scene
4. The falling action scene(s)
5. The dénouement scene(s)
This could also be call the style of the standard
novel. Now, you might ask, are there other forms or styles for
novels? The answer is yes, yes there is, but you won’t like the second
part of this answer. The second part is that except for a couple of rude
exceptions, there are zero best sellers and almost no authors who write in
other forms and styles. Let me give you the short list of the forms or
styles of a novel:
1. The standard form—that’s
outlined above
2. The short story
form—actually somewhat successful with a few best sellers and classics
3. The Roman Fluve form
4. The Cubist form
I’m almost certain there are a couple of other
forms. I think I had six when I wrote about this subject before. My
recommendation is this: unless you are a short story novelist, don’t use any
other than the standard form, and even short story novelists tend to gravitate
to the standard form because it sells more copy. So, what is the short
story form.
I guess I can let that wait until the next
installment.
A few authors write in the short story form of
the novel. This is actually a modern form with very few examples in the
past. One of the first using this form was Ray Bradbury and his
novel, The Martian Chronicles one of the earliest
examples. There might be some others in the past, but they don’t come to
mind or they don’t exist. The Martian Chronicles is a
collection of loosely connected shorts with no strong telic flaw, other than
the exploration of Mars, no single protagonist, and no real climax. Now,
some might think or write that they can find some discernable telic flaw,
protagonist, and climax in the novel, but I’ve also read arguments that the
protagonist was Mars, the planet, and the climax was the human exploration, or
lack thereof, of the planet. Look, it’s a collection of short stories
with some loose cohesion. Bradbury did a much better job with his very
important Dandelion Wine, which is also a collection of short
stories tightly connected to the protagonist with a discernable climax although
a weak one. Dandelion Wine is the greatest novel written
in the Twentieth Century and about the coming of age of the Twentieth Century
as well as the coming of age of the protagonist.
Now, another famous author who writes in the
short story form of the novel is George R. R. Martin. He can write in the
standard form, for example, The Dying of the Light, but his early
great novel Tuff Voyaging is a wonderful example of a true
short story novel connected well through the protagonist and his voyaging
although the telic flaw and the climax is weak. His most famous short
story novels are the Game of Thrones novels. Readers
love and hate them. They love the writing and the shorts, they hate the
way the novels are put together. The telic flaw is loosely the fight for
the throne, while the climax is never very clear. This is why the author
and the producers had such a problem working out how they would present a
television series. In any case, do you see the problems and difficulties
of writing in the short story form?
If you write in this form, you will have
difficulties unless you have established yourself as a great short story
author, like Bradbury or Martin. Even Martin didn’t really separate
himself from the pack as a short story novelist. He really started with a
couple of popular novels and moved along from there. I’d say your chances
in a market with about a million books coming out every year and two known
successes with the short story novel form, in writing in the short story form
is about a few million to one.
My conclusion is that you should stick to short
stories and move to the novella if you are a great short writer. It is
much easier to write a good short that can become a novella and then a regular
novel. I’ve found to my dismay that I write in the 100,000 word range all
the time now. The problem with that is that many publishers are looking
for shorter novels in their new writers. My early novels were in the
65,000 to 85,000 word range and that was the center of the field for many
publishers, especially for a new writer. There are lots of reasons for
this, and I’ll eventually discuss the length of a novel. In any case, I
suggest writing a standard novel. If you write in a short story form,
make your shorts fit together like Bradbury did in Dandelion Wine and
a couple of other novels. The short story form can be used well if it can
be shoehorned into the standard form. The Roman Fluve can’t. I’ll
look at that form, next.
The Roman Fluve form is similar to the short
story form except there is never a single telic flaw nor a singular
climax. The Roman Fluve is very similar to The Martian Chronicles.
The classic novel in the Roman Fluve form is USA by John dos
Pasos. USA has no specific telic flaw and no
climax. It is very similar to just a series of unconnected short
stories. Why it is considered a novel instead of a short story collection
is that a Roman Fluve novel is connected with a theme. The theme
for USA is the United States of America.
I should mention that Roman Fluve means a
river. The idea is basically a stream of consciousness—that’s the fluve
part. The Roman part means that the theme of the Roman Fluve novel is
supposed to be classical or imperial. You might ask, what is the problem
with the Roman Fluve novel?
Did I mention there is no singular protagonist in
the Roman Fluve novel. No singular protagonist, no telic flaw, and not
climax (telic flaw resolution). Since, in my definition, the greatest
novel is a revelation of the protagonist, the Roman Fluve can’t provide this
little bit of greatness. I should write a little about this.
The novel as a revelation of the protagonist is
the highest form of the novel. The wonderful part of this is both the
problem the protagonist must resolve as well as the resolution (climax).
This isn’t just an add—although the novel is the revelation of the protagonist,
the author needs something to hang his or her hat on, as well as something to
write toward and to complete the novel. That thing to write toward and to
complete the novel is the telic flaw and the telic flaw resolution.
A protagonist without some problem to resolve and
with no resolution is like a terrible series novel without a conclusion.
I hate those. You know, the kind you buy as part of the series and you
expect some wonderful resolution at the end and you get nothing. I really
hate that. That’s why I write complete novels even in my series
novels. In any case, this is the problem with the Roman Fluve
novel. Imagine a collection of short stories with no real connection
other than the theme and no telic flaw or conclusion. You might get
really frustrated after the first few stories. In fact, without a
cohesive protagonist, you will get really bored with the novel. If a
novel is the revelation of the protagonist, then switching and dumping protagonists
will get old very fast—and that’s the problem with the short story form novel
as well. If you look at the short story form novel as a collection of
shorts, you don’t have many problems, but if you are looking for a cohesive
revelation of a protagonist you will be disappointed. In fact, a Roman
Fluve novel like USA and a short story novel like The
Martian Chronicles are both driven by theme—one is the USA and the
other is Mars. Go figure. If the novel is the revelation of the
protagonist, both of these fail. Both are classics, but they are unusual
classics. You can also see where George R. R. Martin and The Game
of Thrones fits into this picture. The Game of Thrones is
a collection of shorts as individual chapters that create connected novellas
with a single theme—the throne or the control of the kingdoms. Well
that’s a great modern theme—ha ha.
I’m not a fan of the short story or the Roman
Fluve form. I’ll give you more about the Cubist form, next.
Even more than the Roman Fluve form of the novel,
the Cubist form is both stream of consciousness and stream of
unconsciousness. The Cubist form is literally as elegant and inspiring
and understandable as a Cubist painting. If you can fully comprehend and
enjoy a Cubist painting, perhaps the Cubist novel is for you. Let me give
you some examples.
James Joyce may be the only successful author to
trick people, especially the illuminati, into purchasing and not reading his
Cubist novels. Ulyssis and A Portrait of the
Artist as Young Man are just two of his incomprehensible and unreadable
novels. How do I know? I, unlike most people in the
world, have read all of his novels. They are not worth reading.
When I was a young and foolish young man, I
trusted and believed my teachers and professors were truly educated and
wise. They were neither educated, wise, well read, nor published.
The main point is they were not published because they were crappy writers, and
they thought James Joyce was a legitimate writer. I can tell you, because
I’ve read the novels, all these novels by James Joyce are unreadable,
unpalatable, not entertaining, and not understandable. If you want to
read them yourself, you may, but don’t be surprised if you find them worthless
for human consumption.
As I wrote, I imagined, when I was young and
foolish, that my professors and professorettes were knowledgeable about such
things. Alas, they were themselves deluded and unpublished. The
reason they were unpublished is they could not write a sentence of entertaining
prose or identify a sentence of entertaining prose if it bit them in the
butt. They were ignorant and illeducated, and they tried to pass their
idiocy on to their students. They never imagined anyone would ever read
the crap they thought was so good.
I actually read Ulysses twice just to make
certain I hadn’t missed anything, and I wrote a couple of papers about the
novel because I actually, at one time, thought the novel could actually be
important. The best thing you can do with Ulysses is to use it for
tinder. It is indeed an example of a cubist novel and a worthless piece
of human excrement. By the way, KMRIA. That’s a great synopsis of
Ulysses.
So, if you think you need to write a Cubist
novel, don’t. It will be unsellable and unreadable. If your
professors and professorettes tell you it is a great novel worth reading, you
will know they are idiots. This is the great test of the unpublished and
uneducated. I am published and very well educated and much better read
than most of those preaching illuminate BS in the Universities. Just a
warning to the wise.
Oh, when the professors and professorettes tell
you how great Ulysses is, ask them for a reading. It’s as nutty and
unreadable a Gertrude Stein, another Cubist writer. Let’s actually go to
the actual successful novel form, the standard form.
The standard form of the novel is also known as
the classical form. If you actually had a great education or at least a
good one, you know about the standard form because before the crazies took over
the educational system, this was how you evaluated a novel.
In classic analysis or criticism of a novel, you
evaluate the protagonist, the problem (telic flaw), the plot, the theme, and
the climax. A really good teacher or professor will note and evaluate the
initial scene, the rising action, the climax, the falling action, and the
dénouement. These and this outline are the main elements of a classical
novel.
Now, I’ve been over these before, but we should
go over it again, and I’ll point out the stuff they never told you, that they
should have.
In the first place, the theme is almost
worthless, especially from an author’s standpoint. I have a great writer
friend who just put out a book on theme. It’s a great and very helpful
book for ideas about writing and especially about the theme from the standpoint
of the writer. His book is titled How to Write a Novel that
Matters by Mike Klaassen. I recommend his book and his writing.
Now, Mike takes a little stronger and much more
educated view of theme than I do. He quotes Nancy Kress from Character
Dynamics on theme, and I’ll just pass on a small part of it, “Theme.
The most fraught word in literature.” She and he goes on to spotlight
theme in sense of the classic direction of an English teacher to identify the
theme of a novel, essay, or other writing and then write an essay about
it. I recommend Mike’s book on theme and writing. It’s a very good
read and very helpful, but from my standpoint as well as Nancy’s and Mike’s,
the problem with our general view of theme is itself problematic. Mike
covers the idea of theme in a wonderful and powerful way in his book.
What I want to convey to you in my idea of the theme of a novel is more akin to
the plot statement. I call it the theme statement or just the theme
because I was asked by my mentor to write out a cohesive theme statement for my
novels.
My mentor Roz Young thought that a theme
statement was the most important part for the author to direct their novel—I’m
not so sure. Her idea to theme was as amorphous as Nancy, Mike, and my
idea of the theme statement. Almost impossible to compose and almost
impossible to understand as a simple idea. So, let me write a little
about the theme as the theme statement because this has been helpful to me in
many ways.
In fact, I have opened this blog with the theme
statements from my most recent and potential novels for a while. I’ll
repeat the latest here:
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 32:
Shiggy Tash finds a lost girl in the isolated Scottish safe house her
organization gives her for her latest assignment: Rose Craigie has nothing, is
alone, and needs someone or something to rescue and acknowledge her as a human
being.
For novel 33, Book girl: Siobhàn Shaw is
Morven McLean’s savior—they are both attending Kilgraston School in Scotland
when Morven loses everything, her wealth, position, and friends, and Siobhàn
Shaw is the only one left to befriend and help her discover the one thing that
might save Morven’s family and existence.
For novel 34: Seoirse is assigned to be Rose’s
protector and helper at Monmouth while Rose deals with five goddesses and
schoolwork; unfortunately, Seoirse has fallen in love with Rose.
Plot:
A foreign legion
lieutenant discovers the Egyptian goddesses of good and evil in an ancient
tomb; they are brought to life when the tomb is opened, and their 4000
year old conflict begins again.
Theme:
How do men react to the
spiritual when it is revealed to them plainly, and how do we communicate those
thoughts across centuries and drawing rooms?
You can fins these on the secret pages for the novel.
This is not really what I would call either a theme or plot statement today—my
ideas and knowledge of both have increased and improved. In general, I’ve
tried to define exactly what these mean. Let’s go to the theme statement
first—perhaps I should write one for Aegypt.
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
It's not to say those other novels didn’t do
well—they were published, but their initial scenes might have been more
powerful and better if I knew about writing what I know now. I’m
contemplating republishing my old novels just to get them back out into the
market. I didn’t make an extensive rewrite of Centurion, but
I’m contemplating a complete rewrite of my other novels. We shall
see. In any case, let me try to remember the other three ways to write an
initial scene.
Centurion introduces Abenadar
as a babe in his mother’s womb. This isn’t the best initial scene, but it
works for this novel. As I wrote, if I knew what I do now about writing,
I might not have written some of my novels the way I did. For Centurion the
means works, but it is a historical novel about the life of Abenadar. It
starts a little different than I would recommend.
Many modern authors have
gone back to the first person for their writing which really screws up the
style of the writing. In first person, you can’t help but tell.
Show and don’t tell is the most basic rule in modern writing. I recommend
not writing in first person. I use third person past tense with an
assumption of the future. This is the modern style and the modern form of
the novel. It should sell novels and appeal to the readers. I won’t
go through all the history of how we got here—I’ve done that before. What
I will emphasize is that without a protagonist’s helper, the author is pretty
much compelled to either tell in his or her writing or use dialog with
strangers or others to show the mind of the protagonist.
I guess I need to explain
more about the protagonist and the protagonist’s helper. That’s next.
You must set the scene. An empty stage might work for some plays, but
it can’t work for any novel. A novel
without a scene setting is nothing at all.
It’s not an empty stage it is no stage.
It’s like amorphous pieces floating in the aether. Think about it this way. Without setting elements, there is no novel at
all. The characters, the setting, the
stuff, are all setting elements. So, you
must set the scene of the novel, and no need to do it in a way that excites the
mind of the reader.
You don’t need to George Eliot them with a whole chapter
of scene setting before we get a single motion from a character, but that was
pre-Victorian Era writing. What you need
is enough and more than enough for your readers to imagine the time, place, people,
and things. Once you have the setting in
place, you can let the characters act in that setting and on that stage. As the setting and the stage moves, you must set
it again and again. I usually set the
stage in scenes. Some times the setting
must come in the middle of the scene as the scene moves from setting to
setting. In any case, it is not enough to
give us the time and place—you must then provide the people and things.
When I write people and things, I mean the
setting, descriptions of these elements.
Now to setting elements. The
setting elements are the descriptions of each thing including time and place in
the scene. Each of these needs description. I agree with Arlo Guthrie Jr.: you need about
300 words of description for major setting elements and 100 words for minor
setting elements. We’ll look at this,
next.
The initial scene has some implied input but no
direct input—every other scene in the novel has a direct input. The previous scene supplies the input. Following the input, the first step in
writing the scene is the setting. This
is the scene setting. This is the
easiest part of the scene to write—it’s always the first part to write because
it provides all the elements used in writing the scene—the setting elements.
Look, whether you realize it or not, you always
require setting elements. These are Chekov’s
Guns for the scene and the novel. What
is a Chekov’s Gun. Let me first write
about the setting elements. The characters
must be introduced at some point onto the stage of the novel, the setting. Let’s presume we have set the stage with the
place and time. That means we have
provided at least 300 words of description for the major elements and 100 words
for the minor elements. Don’t get all legalistic
on me about this. If you write a
sentence or two telling us about the time, conditions, and season or time of
year, that’s usually sufficient. Enough
to set the time. Then a paragraphs or
two about the setting itself. The
buildings the terrain, the room and all that jazz.
Next, I advise placing the stuff in the terrain or
the room. You can do this as part of the
scene or as the scene moves along. The
final element, usually, is the characters.
The characters definitely require about 300 words for a major and 100
words for a minor character. You don’t
need complete redescriptions when the same character comes into a scene, but
you need to give them something. We call
these tags, but at the first introduction, we need to know what the character
is wearing. This isn’t like a cartoon or
a movie where the characters always wear the same clothing. Give us at least an idea of how they look and
especially differences.
You can weave these into the narration, dialog,
and action of the scene—just don’t neglect it.
The worst problem with modern writing is too much telling and not enough
description. Confusing and keeping these
kinds of secrets is absolutely silly. I’m
all into secrets, but not secrets about what the reader should be able to immediately
see. That’s just silly and
non-productive. Set the stage of the
novel and set the characters on the stage.
I’ll get to the next part all about setting elements, next.
I want to write another book based on Rose and
Seoirse, and the topic will be the raising of Ceridwen—at least that’s my
plan. Before I get to that, I want to write another novel about
dependency as a theme. We shall see.
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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