Writing - part xxx966 Scene Outline, Novel Outline, Initial Scene Design, The Antagonist, Centurion

 21 February 2025, Writing - part xxx966 Scene Outline, Novel Outline, Initial Scene Design, The Antagonist, Centurion

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 21^st 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:

                     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 31^st 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.

I finished writing my 34^th novel (actually my 32^nd completed novel), Seoirse, potential title Seoirse: Enchantment and the Assignment.  The theme statement is: 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.     

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 30^th novel, working title Red Sonja.  I finished my 29^th novel, working title Detective.  I finished writing number 31, working title Cassandra: Enchantment and the Warrior.  I just finished my 32^nd novel and 33^rd 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 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.

For novel 35: Eoghan, a Scottish National Park Authority Ranger, while handing a supernatural problem in Loch Lomond and The Trossachs National Park discovers the crypt of Aine and accidentally releases her into the world; Eoghan wants more from the world and Aine desires a new life and perhaps love.

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:  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.

In the first place, the purpose of writing is communication—that’s the only purpose.  Writing is the abstract communication of the mind through symbols.  As time goes by, we as writers gain more and better tools and our readers gain more and better appreciation for those tools and skills—even if they have no idea what they are. 

We are in the modern era.  In this time, the action and dialog style along with the push of technology forced novels into the form of third person, past tense, action and dialog style, implying the future.  This is the modern style of the novel.  I also showed how the end of literature created the reflected worldview.  We have three possible worldviews for a novel: the real, the reflected, and the created.  I choose to work in the reflected worldview.

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. 

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. 

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.

With that said, where should we go?  Should I delve into ideas and creativity again, or should we just move into the novel again?  Should I develop a new protagonist, which, we know, will result in a new novel.  I’ve got an idea, but it went stale.  Let’s look at the outline for a novel again:

1.      The initial scene

2.     The rising action scenes

3.     The climax scene

4.     The falling action scene(s)

5.     The dénouement scene(s)

   

I’ll go back to the idea of the initial scene.  This is the most important and pivotal scene in any novel.  This is the scene that sells your novel.  This is the scene that sets your novel.  No novel can exist or even be written without a tight and well developed initial scene.  Much of the reason for this are the elements of the scene which encapsulate the entertainment and scope of the novel.  Most specifically, the protagonist is the main element of the novel and of this scene.

That is not to say you can’t have an initial scene that doesn’t include the protagonist.  However, it may be impossible to have such a scene.  In my published novels, I have had two novels where the protagonist did not show in the initial scene: Centurion and The End of Honor.  In Centurion, the protagonist was in his mother’s womb.  This was a critical place to begin the novel, and I’ll not apologize for it, but this was a very special and different beginning to this and this type of novel.  It’s an historical novel with a direct connection from the protagonist’s mother to the mother of a historical focus of the novel. 

The End of Honor begins with the execution of Lyral Neuterra which starts the great civil war in the Human Galactic Empire.  If the protagonist were there, the execution could have never taken place—he was intentionally and conveniently out of the way when the Prince Regent struck his father and the Princess Lyral down.  This was also a proper initial scene for this novel.  Again, I’ll not apologize for it—it fit the novel.

However, I will conclude that I likely wouldn’t write these types of novels in the future—not because they aren’t great novels, but because my writing has evolved and improved.  I find myself with more intimate and closer held subjects.  When I was a younger writer, my writing was broader with themes of a more grander nature.  With time, the themes because more intimate and closer.  I could achieve a similar feel and a greater entertainment with tighter ideas and stories.  That’s what I think anyway.

The protagonist is necessary to begin a novel—that’s the ultimate point here.  The question is this—should I evaluate the protagonist again, or move toward the initial scene directly?  That’s next.  

I’m really in favor of novels that include a protagonist’s helper especially for modern novels with a Romantic protagonist and to show and not tell the mind of the protagonist.  Another part of the initial scene is the antagonist.  As a writer, I’m really not an antagonist builder or designer.  Perhaps I should be.

 

The way I’ve played this very important part of my writing is to pretty much ignore any focus on the antagonist and to instead center on the revelation of the protagonist.  I’m not really sure why.  That doesn’t mean my novels don’t have an antagonist.  It just means the antagonist is not a primary part of the novel.  The Romantic protagonist is wholly designed to resolve the telic flaw.  I don’t really care as much about what factors or having a primary character who opposes the resolution of the telic flaw.  The best example of this type of novel design or plotting idea is the mystery novel.

 

In a mystery novel, the mystery resolution if the telic flaw.  There may or may not be a direct antagonist.  If the mystery is a puzzle or an exploration, where is the antagonist?  You can always add an antagonist, and that’s not necessarily a bad idea, but the antagonist might not exist in the normal sense.  What I think I’ll do is go through my novels and evaluate the protagonist, protagonist’s helper, antagonist, the telic flaw, and what causes the tension in the novel.  This should be interesting.

     

I’ve never put this completely together before.  Here’s a chronological list of my novels:

 

The Second Mission (399 to 400 BC) – The protagonist for this novel is Alan Fisher and the protagonist’s helper is Sophia, the time traveler.  The telic flaw is to return from 400 BC back to the modern era.  The tension in the novel is two parts: firstly, the mission of Sophia, which is to record the words of Socrates and the society of the time, and secondly, the survival of Alan Fisher who is the unexpected and unlucky person pulled back into the second mission into time.  Who is the antagonist?  That’s a great question.  There are numerous problems and people who cause problems in the novel for Sophia and for Alan, but there is no single person opposing the resolution of the telic flaw.  The telic flaw is to return from the past, but this is not possible to resolve outside of time.  That is, there is nothing Sophia or Alan can do to make this happen faster or slower—it is an inevitable, they hope, fact of the science of time travel.  If this is the antagonist, then this is no common antagonist.  Does this negatively affect the novel, I don’t think so at all.  The novel runs apace as a revelation of the protagonist.  Is it entertaining?  I think it is.  No concrete antagonist is possible for this type of novel, and the tension and telic flaw still run just like they should.

 

Centurion (6 BC to 33 AD) – The protagonist of this novel is Abenadar, the centurion.  The protagonist’s helper eventually shows up as Ruth, but she isn’t a very powerful protagonist’s helper.  The antagonist is the Blue Shawls or the Zealots of the First Century Levant.  This is an okay but very generalized antagonist, and they are not a typical antagonist by any means.  The telic flaw of the novel is the success or promotion of Abenadar in his role in the Roman Legion.  The major cause of the tension in the novel is the events around Abenadar which require his influence and action.   I already wrote about how unusual an initial scene this novel has.  I should mention also that it is being republished by Amazon and will be available, let’s hope, soon.  So a novel with a real antagonist that is not very strongly connected to the tension and release of the novel.  Still we have an antagonist.

 

Aksinya: Enchantment and the Daemon 1917 – 1918 (1920)

Aegypt 1926

Sister of Light 1926 – 1934

Sister of Darkness 1939 – 1945

Shadow of Darkness 1945 – 1953

Shadow of Light 1953 – 1956

Antebellum 1965 (1860 to 1865)

Children of Light and Darkness 1970 – 1971

Warrior of Light 1974 – 1976

Warrior of Darkness 1980 – 1981

Deirdre: Enchantment and the School 1992 - 1993

Cassandra: Enchantment and the Warriors 1993 - 1994

Hestia: Enchantment of the Hearth 2000 - 2001

Essie: Enchantment and the Aos Si 2002 - 2005

Khione: Enchantment and the Fox 2003 - 2004

Blue Rose: Enchantment and the Detective 2008 - 2009

Dana-ana: Enchantment and the Maiden 2009 - 2010

Valeska: Enchantment and the Vampire 2014 - 2015

Lilly: Enchantment and the Computer 2014 - 2015

September 2022 – death of Elizabeth

Sorcha: Enchantment and the Curse 2025 - 2026

2026 death of Mrs. Calloway

Rose: Enchantment and the Flower January to April 2028

Seoirse: Enchantment and the Assignment August to November 2028

science fiction

Escape from Freedom

The End of Honor

The Fox’s Honor

A Season of Honor

Athelstan Cying

Twilight Lamb

Regia Anglorum

Shadowed Vale

Ddraig Goch – not completed

 

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.

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  

fiction, theme, plot, story, storyline, character development, scene, setting, conversation, novel, book, writing, information, study, marketing, tension, release, creative, idea, logic