22 July 2023, Writing - part xxx387 Writing a Novel, Seoirse, Editing, -ing
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 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 Cassandra: Enchantment and the Warriors:
|
|
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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. Writing number 31, working title Shifter. I just finished 32nd novel, Rose.
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.
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.
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)
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.
I’m now writing Seoirse, and since I retired from my day job,
I’m back to a chapter a day. I could
likely write two chapters a day, but my brain gets tired. I think it’s important to report again on how
to write a novel. Let’s start at the
beginning.
I already developed the protagonist for this novel: Seoirse Séamas
Wishart. That is his name in
Gaelic. His common or English name is
George James Wishart. Why the
difference. It all has to do with the
worldview of my novels. The worldview is
reflected and therefore the supernatural exists. We are mainly writing about the common and
mythical supernatural in the world. I’d
like to say that whatever the basis for the usual supernatural in human thought
exists in the reflected worldview of this and my novels. Thus there are vampires, werewolves, fairies,
the Fae courts, dragons, gods, goddesses, and other mythical creatures. They aren’t the world. They world of my novels is the world you see
around you. The supernatural aspects are
generally unseen, unknown, and rare.
They exist like the supernatural exists in the world today: generally
unseen, unknown, and rare. That’s the
basis of the world in my novels.
This is where I am with Seoirse. I’ve been writing a chapter a day. That means I’ll likely have a completed novel
in less than a month. That’s what I
usually do when I have an idea and a novel to write. I’m also writing pretty exclusively when I
should be working on a publisher or an agent.
Here is a list of parts of words and words you can use to
search your documents. I’ll discuss each
of these.
-ing
had
-ly
were
was
gotten
even
said
got
utilize
- ing – What’s so
bad about -ing? Let’s start with just
what the suffix -ing means in English.
Here’s an explanation:
-ing
is a suffix used to make one of the inflected forms of English verbs. This verb form is used as a present participle, as a
gerund, and sometimes as an independent noun or adjective. The suffix is also
found in certain words like morning and ceiling, and in names such as Browning.
-ing as a gerund, I’ll give you the definition here:
- a form that
is derived from a verb but that functions as a noun, in English ending
in -ing, e.g., asking in do you mind
my asking you?.
This is actually a very poor definition. Let me improve and simplify it for you. A gerund is a verb in its present participle
form that is used as a noun. Gerunds are
great—they are just nouns that happen to come from verbs. The form, in English, just happens to be with
an -ing suffix which is also the way we make the present participle verb. The use of gerunds in your novel is not a
problem at all. In fact, they can be
very useful for replacing more common or overused nouns. In addition, some adjectives have the -ing
suffix. These aren’t any kind of problem
either. These are all great words to
use. You can see the use of general
words that happen to have an -ing suffix, like the examples above like morning
or ceiling and names are not a problem either.
These are just normal words, great words for use in your writing. So, what’s the problem?
The problem with the -ing suffix is when it is misused and
overused and incorrectly used in the present participle. You might ask, what’s wrong with the present
participle? The present participle indicates
that action is happening right now and at the same time as other actions. Here’s a example:
Jake is running.
This is the present progressive tense using the present
participle of the verb.
Jake was running.
This is the past progressive tense using the present
participle of the verb.
Since we are usually writing in the past tense, we would use:
Jake was running, in the narrative of our novel. Why write Jake was running when we could
write:
Jake ran.
You just cut a word and four more characters. Not that we are trying to cut words or characters,
but why would you write Jake was running instead of Jake ran?
There are times when you might want to write Jake was
running instead of Jake ran. This is
when Jake was running and doing something else at the same time. The past progressive allows you to write
about two things happening at the same time.
Jake was listening on his phone while he was running. This is a distinct and reasonable sentence,
but why not write:
Jake listened on his phone while he ran.
That’s a lot of word saving, and I think it sounds much
better. Here is my rule for -ing. I search for all present participle verb
usage in my writing. In the dialog, it
should be in the form of “is xxx-ing” and in the narration as “was xxxx-ing.” I just search for all the -ing in the text. Then I evaluate the text in context. If the use of the present participle sounds
and looks right, I leave it as it is. In
most cases, I change it to the regular past tense. Most of the time, the past tense just sounds right
and cuts out extraneous words and verbs.
You don’t want your writing to necessarily be terse, but you want it to flow
and not include anything extraneous. As
an author and a reader, the use of extraneous present participle forms just
irritates me. I don’t know about you,
but I’ve had novels I’ve read that threw me out of the suspension of disbelief
because the author kept using the present participle when the past tense would have
been perfect. I always wonder if that
author thought they were being paid by the number of words and not the cohesive
contents of their novel.
In any case, you don’t need to get rid of every present participle
verb, but you should get rid of most present participle verbs. Just try it.
Read the sentence. If it sounds
perfect in the context of the writing and especially the paragraph, keep it. Try it in the normal past tense. See which sounds better in the context of the
writing. I think you’ll dump almost
every use of the present participle form when you try my advice. Remember the other uses of the -ing suffix as
nouns, adjectives, and in normal words is all good, but you might want to
review those words and word usage for repetition and overuse as well. In other words, if you are looing for -ing
for example and you find something like this:
Jake, looking good, glanced around and was looking for his
pen.
There’s too many “look” in this sentence. I’m not sure how I’d fix it, but you can see
the use of looking as an adjective, and as a present participle in the past
progressive tense. I’d definitely get
rid of the past progressive and fix the adjective so it is more definitive and
not confusing in context.
Dump the present participle and you will improve your
writing. I do.
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. 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
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