Writing - part x965 Writing a Novel, Mysterium

29 August 2019, Writing - part x965 Writing a Novel, Mysterium

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 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

20. Education

Once you could think rationally, the question of philosophy was then to discover the secrets of nature which were always predictable.  This was the next step in religion and in intellectualism—the mysterium.

Let’s see if I can explain this adequately.  Before literacy, animism was the focus of all religious belief.  With literacy, we get pantheonic paganism and rationalism.  Before literacy, spirits caused everything to happen from fire to weather to emotions.  Remember, this is before humans could really think rationally.  Emotions, like the spirits in nature, were a force of the spirits moving and acting on a person.  Because of this, everyone was fated. 

You can see the results of these ideas in Greek, Anglo Saxon, and Roman epic poetry.  The characters are all fated.  The results are already written in the heavens, and no human or god can change them.  In Greek thought even the gods were fated.  The word pathos in Greek was the fate of man, and the word chronos in Greek was the fate of the gods.  Because of the spirits of nature and the world, all beings were fated—and then cam rationalism.

With rationalism driven by literacy and by the historical-legal method, humans could observe and record that powers and events were not fate driven.  They began to see that fire, life, gestation, powers in nature all had some cause and effect--they just couldn’t understand the cause.  They knew, for example, that some kind of force in nature caused fire, they saw the result, but what was the cause? 

They called these predictable results “secrets.”  For example, there was the secret of Osiris which was pi.  There was the secret of Pythagoras which was the Pythagorean Theorem.  There was the secret of Demeter which was a seed, a sword, and a phallic symbol (not sure where they got that one).  These secrets had their own “god” or prophet and their own secret knowledge—they were called mysteriums, and they were the next step in religion.  

A secret was akin to mixing bicarbonate with vinegar.  You always get a reaction—an effect.  The cause was the god.  These mysteriums were the major focus of all worship from about 500 BC to today.  However, today, many mysteriums are not called mysteriums or even considered religions.  Any group that has a secret available only to the members or worshipers with an initiation ceremony and degrees of initiation or knowledge is a mysterium.  The Masons are a mysterium.  Most fraternities and sororities are mysteriums.  The Church of Christ of the Latter Day Saints (Mormons) are a mysterium.  There are others.  Some churches and religions and many somewhat secular organizations. 

Christianity is not a mysterium, but it looked like one to the first century, and Paul ensured it looked so much like a mysterium that many Greeks tried it out.  Christianity has many characteristic of a mysterium, the real differences is that although Christianity has an initiation, the secret is not secret.  The Secret of Faith is, “Christ had died.  Christ is risen.  Christ will come again.”  There are no levels of knowledge or initiation in Christianity, but it shares many features with mysteriums: baptism, meal with the deity, initiation, renaming, reclothing, position, sex, and wealth being immaterial, and others. 

The most important feature of the mysteriums was that they engendered philosophy because they led to people observing an effect, the secret, and considering the cause.  So, whether a cause or an effect of the mysterium, philosophy came with the religion of mysterium. 

Do you see how this is working?  We see this in every human culture.  Animism until literacy.  Panthoeonic paganism until philosophy.  Then mysterium until…what’s next?  The evaluation or realization of the cause is next.

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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