As I said in Fridays post, I've decided to do a little how I plan festival as I get ready for NaNo. I love reading about how other writers plan--in part because I love stealing ideas. Really, nothing here is new--I've stolen everything from classes, conferences, critique partners, bloggers, etc. But regardless, this is how I go about it:
I've broken it down into sevenish steps:
1. Selecting an Idea/ Establishing Voice
2. Organizing Plot Points
3. Creating the Slow Burn (not in every novel, but my NaNo has one, so I'll chat about it)
4. The Downward Spiral
5. Detailing Secondary Characters
6. Maps, diagrams and other paraphernalia
7. Putting it all together in Scrivener and pounding out 80,000ish words in about two months
Today--I'm focusing on selecting and idea and establishing voice--one of my favorite parts of planning a novel.
Like anyone, the first thing I've got to do is select an idea. I don't keep ideas written anywhere--I prefer just to hang onto them in my head. If an idea is really wonderful, then it won't let me forget it. All those ideas I've already forgotten, I don't need them cluttering up my laptop or brain. My father used to say that there are only so many available synaptic connections in your brain, and you shouldn't give up room to unnecessary ideas or unnecessary people (he's an interesting guy).
I select an idea based on voice. My last WiP had a MC with a sarcastic, humorous voice. The one before that was distant and proud. So I picked something different this time--sweet, feminine and--the best part--a simile user. I haven't written a simile user in a long time, and I've been missing that.
So I pick the voice (which usually has some vague idea of story attached to it--but I don't worry about that yet), and then I spend a little bit of time fiddling around with it. I do this by writing a selection of about 250-3000 words. It can be from anywhere in the novel, but frequently it is what I call a "false start". Meaning that it is the first words of the rough draft, but never the first words of the finished novel.
As I write these words, I'm focusing only on voice and the elements that make up voice: diction, syntax, humor, passion, etc. What is actually happening in the section is completely irrelevant.
So I just write. And then I go over it, piecing together what elements make up the specific voice. I try and do this very deliberately--looking at each sentence--so that I can replicate that voice again when I start working on the draft.
For my last novel, the "false start" was about 2,000 words. I've attached the first few hundred words below. In red are the things I thought (as far as I can remember) when going back over it in an attempt to nail the voice. Remember--this is all about finding voice. It is okay if the selection isn't your best writing because the goal is to establish that character's voice and personality, not create a masterpiece. And, to be clear, this isn't the false start for my NaNo novel--different MC here.
I slide into the seat across from a blonde girl with a sweater that stretches just tight enough over her boobs to make my imagination somersault (diction here--use of boobs, blonde girl--all very casual. Also a little pervy, but not enough that it is uncomfortable for me). More like four backflips followed by a handspring (humor here--kind of lightly sarcastic, but even though he's still talking about her, he's making fun of himself). She crosses her legs, bouncing a chunky shoe too heavy for her foot (interest in what she's wearing, but not an interest in fashion--he looks at it practically instead of fashionably). Her toenails are painted a pretty pink color that reminds me of my sister’s room when she was like six-years-old (after getting over the fact that a hot girl reminds him of his sister, the simile is very wandering and uncompact--and he brings it back to family).
We wait while everyone else gets on, me praying that no one will sit on me (first mention of anything about him physically--and it isn't a description but a strange kind of joke--suggesting an irrelevance about himself, his appearance), and then the 156 (identifying buses by number suggests that he takes a lot of them) rumbles away from the corner. She bounces her foot a little, the leather strap of her shoe cutting a raw line into her ankle (it is odd to me that he notices her possible discomfort. And he's getting a little obsessed with her feet).
And like that, I decide to follow her home.
I don’t want to sound like a creeper (slang. He is addressing the reader directly--and he's got a little drama about him. Starting a new paragraph after the sentence about following her home--he wanted to leave the reader hanging for a moment). I wouldn’t do anything to her. It’s just curiosity. I want to see where she lives and what it is like to be her. It’s not like I have anything else to do.
My wanting to follow her has nothing to do with her tight, fuzzy sweater. I swear. (odd humor again--if it is humor--making fun of himself, but also giving me a little bit of a chill by feeling the lie in his words)
From these thoughts, I usually end up with about a page of handwritten notes that go something like this:
This kid has an interesting sense of self-deprecating humor. He's a little pervy and creepy, but he wants the reader to believe that he's a good guy (as seen by the direct address). He uses short, direct sentences and paragraphs. He speaks casually--not afraid of slang. His diction is simple and not overly descriptive.
It is very possible that a reader would completely disagree with me and my notes--which is why I don't send this out for critique at all. At this point, it isn't about what the reader thinks, it is only about getting to know your character. There are a variety of other ways I could have done this--interviewing him, writing a summary of their him story, drawing him and his world, making collages that represent him. I've tried all these things in the past--but for me, writing the voice is the quickest and easiest way.
I work on this false start until I can hear the tenor and rhythm of the character's voice in my head. This used to take me thousands of words--now it usually happens in less than a thousand. My NaNo false start is 756 words, and I feel fairly confident about finding her voice on Nov. 1st.
Once I'm starting to get a solid feeling of the voice, I attempt to make a kind of catch phrase for the character--something that gets me very quickly into their voice when I sit down to write.
Examples of some catch phrases I've use for both current and past WiPs:
Apparently, I'm not bullet proof.
There are no choices, only consequences.
I will not be your answer.
It's always best to dump a girl on Friday--that way your weekend is free.
I guess after awhile, you can accept anything about yourself.
Most of these probably don't mean all that much to someone else. But for me, they spur a whole world of thoughts and allow me to jump into the character's head quickly. I often only have few minutes to write here and there, so I don't want to spend the time fumbling around to find the character's voice.
Another way to handle the catch phrase idea is to create a sentence that starts "She/he is the kind of person who..."
Examples:
She is the kind of person who uses her fork to feed her dog from the dinner table.
He is the kind of person who polishes his shoes every day.
But I don't spend loads of time doing this (maybe a few hours total--for selecting the idea, detailing the voice and writing the catch phrase). My goal at this point isn't to know every detail about my main character because I like getting to know them slowly. But--I don't want to spend the first half of a novel figuring out the voice and what my character would do in any given situation.
I have to do this before I nail down the main plot points. The reason is that it isn't about what happens in a story, but about how the character responds to what happens. Therefore, it is impossible for me to plot out a story without knowing a little about my main character.
At this point, I'm ready to begin working on the plot. Which is next time: Organizing Plot Points.
What is your first step after selecting an idea? Do you tackle the character first or the plot?
Note--I'm having huge difficulties managing the fonts when I'm copying text into blogger. I'm always having to select larger/smaller fonts and things look CRAZY in the editing screen. Does anyone else have this problem? Ways to solve it?
