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Wednesday, March 31, 2021

Writing - part xx545 Writing a Novel, Turning the Telic Flaw into Mentor Plots

 31 March 2021, Writing - part xx545 Writing a Novel, Turning the Telic Flaw into Mentor 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.  Here’s the list of plots I’ve looked at already:

 

Redemption:  the protagonist must make an internal or external change to resolve the telic flaw. This is the major style of most great modern plots.

 

Revelation:  the novel reveals portions of the life, experiences, and ideas of the protagonist in a cohesive and serial fashion from the initial scene to the climax and telic flaw resolution.

 

Achievement:  the novel is characterized by a goal that the protagonist must achieve to resolve the telic flaw. 

 

I evaluated the list of plots and categorized them according to the following scale:

 

Overall (o) – These are the three overall plots we defined above: redemption, achievement, and revelation.

 

Achievement (a) – There are plots that fall under the idea of the achievement plot. 

 

Quality (q) – These are plots based on a personal or character quality.

 

Setting (s) – These are plots based on a setting.

 

Item (i) – These are plots based on an item.

 

All of the plots we looked at fall into one of these five.  Let’s do that:

 

Overall (o)

1.     Redemption (o) – 17i, 7e, 23ei, 8 – 49%

2.     Revelation (o) –2e, 64, 1i – 60%

3.     Achievement (o) – 16e, 19ei, 4i, 43 – 73%

 

Achievement (a)

1.     Detective or mystery (a) – 56, 1e – 51%

2.     Revenge or vengeance (a) –3ie, 3e, 45 – 46%

3.     Zero to hero (a) – 29 – 26%

4.     Romance (a) –1ie, 41 – 37%

5.     Coming of age (a) –1ei, 25 – 23%

6.     Progress of technology (a) – 6 – 5%

7.     Discovery (a) – 3ie, 57 – 54%

8.     Money (a) – 2e, 26 – 25%

9.     Spoiled child (a) – 7 – 6%

10.  Legal (a) – 5 – 4%

11.  Adultery (qa) – 18 – 16%

12.  Self-discovery (a) – 3i, 12 – 13%

13.  Guilt or Crime (a) – 32 – 29%

14.  Proselytizing (a) – 4 – 4%

15.  Reason (a) – 10, 1ie – 10%

16.  Escape (a)  – 1ie, 23 – 21%

17.  Knowledge or Skill (a) – 26 – 23%

18.  Secrets (a) – 21 – 19%

 

Quality (q)

1.     Messiah (q) – 10 – 9%

2.     Adultery (qa) – 18 – 16%

3.     Rejected love (rejection) (q) – 1ei, 21 – 20%

4.     Miscommunication (q) – 8 – 7%

5.     Love triangle (q) – 14 – 12%

6.     Betrayal (q) – 1i, 1ie, 46 – 43%

7.     Blood will out or fate (q) –1i, 1e, 26 – 25%

8.     Psychological (q) –1i, 45 – 41%

9.     Magic (q) – 8 – 7%

10.  Mistaken identity (q) – 18 – 16%

11.  Illness (q) – 1e, 19 – 18%

12.  Anti-hero (q) – 6 – 5%

13.  Immorality (q) – 3i, 8 – 10%

14.  Satire (q) – 10 – 9%

15.  Camaraderie (q) – 19 – 17%

16.  Curse (q) – 4 – 4%

17.  Insanity (q) – 8 – 7%

18.  Mentor (q) – 12 – 11%

 

Setting (s)

1.     End of the World (s) – 3 – 3%

2.     War (s) – 20 – 18%

3.     Anti-war (s) –2 – 2%

4.     Travel (s) –1e, 62 – 56%

5.     Totalitarian (s) – 1e, 8 – 8%

6.     Horror (s) – 15 – 13%

7.     Children (s) – 24 – 21%

8.     Historical (s) – 19 – 17%

9.     School (s) – 11 – 10%

10.  Parallel (s) – 4 – 4%

11.  Allegory (s) – 10 – 9%

12.  Fantasy world (s) – 5 – 4%

13.  Prison (s) – 2 – 2%

 

Item (i)

1.     Article (i) – 1e, 46 – 42%

 

Let’s start with the idea of an internal and external telic flaw.  Then let’s provide it a wrapper.  The wrapper is the plot.      

 

If we have a protagonist, we have a telic flaw.  In fact, we should have an internal and an external telic flaw.  We want to take the telic flaw and turn it into an overall plot and plots. 

 

In looking at the classics and most specifically, the plots in the classics, it became obvious that every novel contains more than one plot.  In fact, all novels contain many plots that support the telic flaw resolution.  This was unexpected for me.  I just presumed that each novel just had a plot, but evaluation of plots in a novel showed us this just wasn’t true.  What is true is there should be only one telic flaw in a novel and the various plots all work together to resolve the telic flaw.  We also saw that there can be an internal and external telic flaw.  These are usually resolved in the same climax.

 

I showed and charted the various plots we find in the first Harry Potty novel.  These are listed below.  All of these plot types and plots result in the resolution of the telic flaw of the first Harry Potty novel.

 

In Harry Potty you have these plots: 

 

Overall (o)

1.     Redemption (o) – 17i, 7e, 23ei, 8 – 49% - yeap, Harry must change and learn about wizarding or something.

2.     Revelation (o) –2e, 64, 1i – 60% - yeap, the whole wizarding world

3.     Achievement (o) – 16e, 19ei, 4i, 43 – 73% - yeap, Harry must defeat Voldermort.

 

Achievement (a)

1.     Detective or mystery (a) – 56, 1e – 51% - yeap, Harry has to solve some mysteries

2.     Revenge or vengeance (a) –3ie, 3e, 45 – 46% - yeap, presumed since Voldermort murdered Harry’s parents

3.     Zero to hero (a) – 29 – 26% - yeap, Harry is a hero from supposed zero (not a very good one)

4.     Romance (a) –1ie, 41 – 37% - yeap, very slight.

5.     Coming of age (a) –1ei, 25 – 23% - yeap, presumed.

6.     Discovery (a) – 3ie, 57 – 54% - yeap, all about magic.

7.     Self-discovery (a) – 3i, 12 – 13% - yeap, coming of age is self-discovery

8.     Reason (a) – 10, 1ie – 10% - yeap, the end climax is based in the use of magic, chess thinking, riding a broom, and figuring out what the philosopher’s stone can do.

9.     Knowledge or Skill (a) – 26 – 23% - yeap, that’s magic.

10.  Secrets (a) – 21 – 19% - yeap, everybody has a secret in the wizard world

 

Quality (q)

1.     Messiah (q) – 10 – 9% - yeap, Harry is a messiah.

2.     Betrayal (q) – 1i, 1ie, 46 – 43% - yeap, Longshanks gets betrayed and that turns the success of Griffindor.

3.     Blood will out or fate (q) –1i, 1e, 26 – 25% - yeap, Harry was born to be the messiah.

4.     Magic (q) – 8 – 7% - yeap, it’s all about magic.

5.     Camaraderie (q) – 19 – 17% - yeap, with his friends.

6.     Curse (q) – 4 – 4% - yeap, the mark and his power over Voldermort.

7.     Mentor (q) – 12 – 11% - kinda, you get this more in the other novels, but Harry has his mentors throughout.

 

Setting (s)

1.     War (s) – 20 – 18% - yeap, Voldermort is at war with the rest of the wizard world.

2.     Travel (s) –1e, 62 – 56% - yeap, some travel to Hogswart and around.

3.     Horror (s) – 15 – 13% - kinda, it’s low grade, but supposed to excite.

4.     Children (s) – 24 – 21% - obviously

5.     School (s) – 11 – 10% - duh

6.     Parallel (s) – 4 – 4% - yeap, with the real world.  This is a reflected worldview.

7.     Fantasy world (s) – 5 – 4% - yeap, there ain’t no real magic out there.

 

Item (i)

Article (i) – 1e, 46 – 42% - yeap, the broom, the philosopher’s stone, the mirror

 

Writing to you from 11,000 feet up in the air on the way to Florida.  I’m the pilot.

 

Here’s the question for us as authors.  If we have a protagonist with his or her telic flaw (the telic flaw of the novel) can we plot shop to help write and improve our novel?  You’d think the answer should be a resounding yes.  The actual answer is a resounding meh.  Most of the time, the protagonist and the setting determines large portions of the plots.  This is really important to understand.  Let’s continue on with Harry Potty looking at the setting plots now.

 

Setting (s)

1.     War (s) – 20 – 18% - yeap, Voldermort is at war with the rest of the wizard world.

2.     Travel (s) –1e, 62 – 56% - yeap, some travel to Hogswart and around.

3.     Horror (s) – 15 – 13% - kinda, it’s low grade, but supposed to excite.

4.     Children (s) – 24 – 21% - obviously

5.     School (s) – 11 – 10% - duh

6.     Parallel (s) – 4 – 4% - yeap, with the real world.  This is a reflected worldview.

7.     Fantasy world (s) – 5 – 4% - yeap, there ain’t no real magic out there.

 

We might be getting somewhere with setting plots as well.  We may be able to choose setting plots for our novel separately from the protagonist.  Perhaps not, but I think there is again some scope here that the achievement plots didn’t have.  Let’s look at the war plot.

 

Harry Potty is definitely set in a war plot.  Unfortunately or fortunately, this is due to the protagonist and the protagonist setting.  In other words, there is very little scope to change this.  I pointed out before.  This is also somewhat of an end of the world plot, but it is a moderated type of end of the world plot.  If Voldermort succeeds, the wizard world as it exists will be changed until the next messiah comes around.  What Rowling has given us is a classic British war plot with a cold war on the ground until the bullets, um spells, start flying.

 

This is a pretty great idea.  I set many of my novels in the cold war period and the wars of the Twenty First Century.  It is a stroke of genius to create a similar tension as an undercurrent in the novel.  This is also the type of tension many of the Victorian Era authors didn’t take advantage of but could.  You see in the Victorian Era and before, Britain was involved in numerous colonial and European wars, this created some degree of tension in the people of the times, but it is mostly ignored by the Victorian authors.  We do get A Tale of Two Cities from Dickins and a few other pieces where war is the setting and war is a huge tension development, but not much.

 

Rowling has created a war tension that pervades most of the novels.  She really could have moderated this setting and the tension, but she didn’t and although it does get slightly old, it is a great bit of tension development.  I can’t fault her approach or her writing in this setting, but I can show you how to improve on it.

 

First, the rest of the wizarding world doesn’t really seem to act as if there is any real problem with the war against Voldermort.  It’s as if the communist party controlled the wizard government during the actual cold war and they never did anything to confront the Soviets.  You get the impression that the wizard government is mostly for show with little real power.  Rowling does an adequate job showing this tension, but then leaves most of it to the kids.  I guess that’s what a kids novel is all about—the kids are the heroes and the ultimate power.  That’s not the way it is in the real world.

 

Kid are kids.  They are not very knowledgeable, not experienced, not usually very wise, and not trained in the very important skills for war or conflict.  In a kid’s novel, you can ignore all this, but it isn’t reality even in the wizard world.  You get some incompetent and conflicted adults in Harry Potty, but the real wise and powerful get waxed and can’t help much.

 

Pardon me for liking a little more reality, but children need to be reminded that adults are what they are aiming for.  Even in a kid’s novel, they need mentors who are competent and have all the skills expected of an adult.  This is what reality and great literature is about.  I know that blows the messiah plot, but I don’t like messiah plots.  Let’s settle for some reality.

 

In most novels about youth, the youth realize their faults and needs.  They realize that don’t have the same knowledge and skills of their mentors, teachers, and adult leaders.  This is the way the world really works.  I’m not sure you can have Harry Potty without a pouty messiah with an army of unbelievably skilled children—the children’s army.  Look it up, it didn’t go well.

 

Whatever, the war setting plot is an excellent one.  It allows many powerful tension developing creative elements.  It has great legs.  It may not be fully appropriate for kids literature—unless written from a proper perspective.  Use it, and use it well.

 

In the end, we can figure out what makes a work have a great plot, and apply this to our writing.     

      

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
  

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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