Points of Light – A new way to outline

Light in the darkness

There’s a concept in Dungeons & Dragons. It’s that the world is full of darkness, and the cities you visit are points of light in that darkness. They protect people from the monsters, devils, and natural disasters so common in the darkness. Your adventurers also fit that description.

Recently, I began working on an outline for a story. Unlike most of my stories, I had no idea where the plot was going, only who the characters were. So I sat down and started listing those characters and the places where I’d already written scenes. Halfway through I realized that I knew exactly what character arcs I wanted those characters to go through. Which, of course, began to shape a plot within my mind.

I’m sure you’re wondering what this has to do with D&D. Everything. You see, if your outline begins with those points of light (characters and locations), then they begin to form constellations in the darkness. The plot naturally flows from the characters, instead of around them.

Your characters, and the places they travel are the dots. The plot connects those dots. The story is the finished picture.

I’m really enjoying this method of outlining. It might even become my main way to do it.

Lessons From NaNoWriMo

NaNoWriMo is an event that spans the month of November with two goals: Increase your word count, and help you finish a first draft. Many writers (especially new ones) struggle with both of those things.

Personally, I’ve never had trouble with either in the past. The first draft of my debut novel was done in about a year (and I was working on at least 4 other stories at the time). I also could boast 4,000+ words on the days that I wrote, because I was passionate about my writing and had lots of free time.

Then I published a book. The last six months leading up to that release date were the hardest I’d ever worked on a single writing project. I couldn’t sleep, I forced myself to forego other forms of entertainment in favor of editing and rewriting, and I couldn’t write any of my other ideas for fear of losing interest in that story.

Needless to say, when I finally let go of that book and left it to the hands of the masses, I stopped writing. For a month and a half all I did was read, watch TV, and play games. It was a much needed brake… and it ruined my writing flow. When I sat down to begin the newest draft of The Coming Storm (the sequel to my debut) I could barely sit still long enough to write a paragraph.

Slowly, as I let my mind wander to my other stories, I upped that to a scene per sitting. Then to two to three sittings per day. But I wasn’t even hitting 1,000 words per day (outside of the occasional blog post). It was a depressing time for me. I felt like I’d ruined my only shot at a career I was good at. (I’m no master yet, but I recognize my talent for what it is)

Along came NaNoWriMo. It was the middle of October and I could see this event looming on the horizon. I had wanted to participate since the year before when I’d discovered it; I’d even written an outline for a story that I swore I wouldn’t write outside of the event. And here I was, barely writing anything. So I forced myself to write; 500 words per sitting minimum, or I couldn’t read or watch anything… and no more games (except my weekly Tabletop). This also meant no food either, since I’m incapable of eating without something to entertain me during a meal.

I had begun to write nearly 2,000 words every day I wrote, but I wasn’t writing every day yet. November hit and I tried my hardest. I still couldn’t make myself write daily, but I was consistently writing around 1,500 – 3,000 words on the days I did. I even took note that the further behind I got from the par goal on the website the more I wrote on that day.

Lesson the first:
Deadlines Matter (or Set Goals)
Even arbitrary ones like NaNoWriMo help improve word count. Telling myself “You have to write 8,000 words today to have any hope of succeeding” made me write more than I had on any previous day that month.

Lesson the second:
Arbitrary Deadlines Can Only Get You So Far
Yep, I just said they are helpful. Now I’m going to explain why they aren’t. In NaNoWriMo the result of failing is a resounding “Oh well, I’ll try again next year”. There is no punishment, no consequences for failing to meet your deadline. Why? Because it’s meant to encourage new writers, and 50,000 words in a thirty day period is hard for some veterans.

When I was given six months to finish my novel or give up as an author, it kicked me into high gear. I worked harder than I ever had to ensure that I had a product I was proud of, and a career I loved. (And that same deadline is hanging over my head now for book 2) When I was given thirty days to write a first draft of a book that might not be published for years, I felt no urgency. I nagged myself to do it, but I knew failure was totally an option. There was no downside.

Lesson the third:
I’m a Seat-of-my-pants Writer
I’ve always written as the ideas come to me, and outlines were difficult for me. I knew that it was considered out of the ordinary to do so though, so I tried outlining when I could. The first book I ever published had an outline, so I made myself do one for NaNoWriMo as well, assuming it would help me meet the goal. I was wrong. The outline for my first book was a great starting point, and a neat thing to show my friend, but the final story was so different from that outline that I’m not even sure it was worth doing in the first place. And my NaNoWriMo project? I had a hard time writing it every day because the outline was so detailed that I felt like the story was already written.

When I hit that 4,000+ mark in a day of writing, it’s because I’m writing as the ideas come. I’m switching stories in the middle of a scene. I don’t have a schedule or force myself to stick to a single story. Sometimes I’m not even writing prose, and am, instead, writing pages of backstory that no one will ever read. That’s what works for me. It may not work for you.

Above all else, NaNoWriMo has taught me where to start a new writer. If you hope to someday make a career out of writing: Start with setting a realistic goal. (I will write and finish a first draft in 2015. I will outline a story during the month of February.) Move from there, to adding deadlines with consequences. (If I don’t finish my first draft in the next six months, I have to sell my Xbox. If I don’t write 2,000 words today then I can’t watch a movie with my friends.) Follow through. (I actually did sell my Xbox in pursuit of my career.) If you can’t bring yourself to do it, have a friend be in charge of the punishment; they will usually do it. Use an arbitrary deadline (like NaNoWriMo) to discover what kind of writer you are. If you normally outline, force yourself to write a first draft without doing it. If you never outline, force yourself to before you even start writing. Let the absence of fearing failure allow you to experiment, while still having a deadline hanging over your head.

I didn’t meet my goal of 50,000 words this November, but I did manage to triple my word count from the four months leading up to it combined. I’d say, in the regard of improving my word count (and reminding me why I write in the first place), it was a success. And for that I deserve this badge, even if the website disagrees.

The Secret to Writing Good Female Characters

There is one singularly important rule to writing good female characters. It’s a rule often forgotten (or possibly not known in the first place) by most writers. What is that rule? You can’t. That’s right, there is no such thing as a good female character. No good male characters either. The moment the character’s gender defines them, they cease to be good characters.

Your goal as a writer is to make two kinds of characters: Believable & Complex. Believable characters sometimes follow stereotypes (because real people do), and their gender might define them. These characters are useful, especially as secondary characters, because they ground the story in that space where the reader suspends all disbelief and accepts whatever else you throw at them. Complex characters, on the other hand, are actually more like real people than the believable ones. They remind that reader that not everyone is who they seem, and nothing they do is driven by a single desire. These are the good characters.

Every character you write can’t be good (the odds are against you), but they can all be good or useful. You have to decide when writing about the character if they are believable and useful, or good and complex.

How do you tell if you’re on the right track for writing a good character? First, ask what motivates them. If you don’t get back multiple answers and a flash of backstory, you aren’t there yet. If you get one of those things, you’re on the right path at least. Second, and this is something writing teachers should make their students do more often, swap the genders of all of your story’s characters. Yep, you heard me. That creepy stalker guy who wants to murder the innocent teenage girl? Turn it into a stalker girl who wants to murder a teenage boy. Does the story still work without changing anything?

Naturally, there are a few things that can’t survive a gender swap (Pregnancy is the most obvious), but 99% of the things in your story should work exactly the same if all of the characters swap genders. The muscle-headed barbarian can be a woman (without it turning comedic), the sexy stripper can be a man, the video game nerd can be a girl. Because people are like that in real life.

I once spoke to a man about the woman lead of his short story. He told me that he had something great, but that he was getting complaints about his lead from the women in his life. She was “too slutty, and it was demeaning to women”. But the story didn’t work if she wasn’t a slut. I said “so turn her into a man”. “But men can’t be sluts.” I took a moment to laugh at the absurdity of that statement (a very common belief I might add), and then told him “exactly”. If the story only worked with the main character being a sexed obsessed loser, then keep it that way, but gender isn’t important there. He did as I asked and his girlfriend told him how much better the story was. Literally nothing had changed. Because he had written a good character. (Side note: I have no idea if he ever tried to publish it.)

Many people write characters that are gimmicky, and no matter how complex of a character they are, the thing that makes them important is their sex organ. How man women in books get what they want because they walk around with their boobs out, how many men are defined by the conversations they have pissing in a urinal. (No lie, many a movie plots would cease to progress if two men used the stalls instead.)

You would have to decide for yourself if my debut novel is good or not. It’s up to the reader to decide if the characters come across the way they’re intended. What’s not up for debate? The characters are complex; they are good characters. Each of them is driven by three or four dominating forces, and a whole host of minor character flaws. You can swap the genders of everyone in my book and nothing in the story changes one bit. They are 4 brothers and their male friend, but that doesn’t define them. In fact a couple of them would be more socially accepted if they were women (though, again, it wouldn’t affect the story… only the reader’s opinion). They are real characters, experiencing real emotions and thoughts, waist deep in high fantasy.

The point of all of this is that you should never set out to write a character because their gender is not represented in your story. You should also not be afraid to write a character who happens to fall into a gender stereotype, so long as that doesn’t define them. If you do often write stereotypes, and are aware of this problem and want to fix it, change the genders of whichever character it happens to. Write them from the other gender. You’ll be surprised at how well rounded they end up being.

Improving Word Count

As we enter the second half of NaNoWriMo, I find myself thinking about word counts. My personal word count has always been pretty high on days that I write, but I don’t write every day. That makes a 30 day writing challange very difficult for me. We’re halfway through the challenge and many days are marked 0. It confuses the website tracker, and makes me feel like I’m failing, even when I know I can catch up in a heartbeat. So I sat down with the intention of figuring out exactly how I could remedy this problem, and I came up with the following.

There are two main ways to increase you word count when writing. Unfortunately, they contradict each other.

Way 1: Don’t care about your writing.
If you have no emotional interest in your writing (paper for school, article for money) then finishing it becomes the only goal. When you are doing any activity just to finish it, that activity gets done much faster than otherwise. This is known as “Quantity over quality”, and is the motto for many companies that exist today. It’s how a writer can publish a new Novella every week without fail.
The downside to this is that quailty isn’t even a part of the equation using this method. That leaves this method ideal for First Drafts, but completely useless for final products.

Way 2: Be passionate.
The exact opposite of the first method. If you are extremely passionate about what you’re writing, the words will just flow to the page with little effort. It’s why I can write a blog post when I feel like crap and don’t want to write. It’s why the first few scenes you write for any project are so much easier than the rest.
The downside to this is that you can’t control your passion. No matter how hard you try, the passion comes and goes as it pleases.

So what do you do? That isn’t an easy answer. There are many little tricks to increase word count, and you should try them out for yourself, but the two main ways are very dependant on how much you care about a project. Chances are, if you only rely on passion, you’re never going to finish anything, but you’ll have a lot of projects. (I speak from experience here) On the other hand, if you never care about what you’re writing, it can never be worth reading.

The best idea I can come up with is compromise. Always write when passion strikes, but force yourself to not care during first drafts. The point of a first draft isn’t to be good anyway, right? Use that to your advantage, and pump out the base story as fast as possible. Then take your time and make it good, even if that means writing a bit slower. Word count shouldn’t be a priority on later drafts anyway. By the time you make it to a fifth draft, the book is about as long as its ever going to be, so don’t worry about that.

Musing about Muses (Thoughts & Ideas)

I recently read an article about excuses writers use to keep themselves from writing, and why you should not let those excuses affect your writing. (see here) I rather enjoyed it, and I agreed with what was being said up until the part about Muses.

A muse is something that grants inspiration. Sure, there probably aren’t physical beings whispering in our ears, but people are inspired all the time. For many Fantasy authors, Tolkien or D&D are their muses. For most bands, other bands that came before are their muses. We all have muses.

Not everyone has an artistic muse. Some of us are inspired mathematicians. Some of us are inspired tacticians. Architects, priests, office managers, taxi drivers; we all are inspired to do something. Not everything you do (especially in the case of money) is something you were inspired to do, but that inspiration exists somewhere.

I have many muses. I have a Fantasy muse, a Sci-Fi muse, a Romance muse, a tactical muse, a gaming muse, and even a non-fiction muse. Sometimes those muses are silent, and I choose not to do activities related to them until they speak again, but they are always there.

Because here’s the thing: Everything that is created without inspiration is doomed to failure. Maybe it’s a success financially (which is often the reason it happens in the first place), but artistically, structurally, it can not stand on its own. That isn’t to say inspiration guarantees success (it doesn’t) but it is required for true success.

Since the article that spawned this discussion was about writing, let’s use that. When you are editing or revising, you don’t need inspiration; you just need an understanding of the “rules” and what you’re trying to convey. When you’re writing a first draft, you don’t need inspiration (though it certainly helps). Your inspiration; your muse; must be present during the concept stage, and the outlining stage. If you are just creating a formulaic story to sell books and make money, you are not likely to ever want to finish. More importantly, your readers will be able to tell.

The reason writers (hobby writers usually) complain about not having a muse, is because they haven’t discovered how it works yet. It’s there, but it’s silent when they want to write… and writing without inspiration becomes a chore. Nobody wants the thing they love to feel like work (even when they want it to be their job). Editing should be work. Revising should be work. You want those things to be professional and well done. General writing should be inspired, and maybe even fun.

I exclusively only write concepts, outlines, and first drafts when I’m inspired to do so. That may mean I go days or weeks without writing sometimes, but when I do write it’s often several thousand words at once. I have every intention of reaching my 50,000 word goal for NaNoWriMo, even if I don’t write every day. Because I know what my muse is, and how it operates. You should discover yours, and listen to it.

The Dreaded Rewrite (Thoughts & Ideas)

It’s been said a dozen times over that the first draft isn’t about good writing. You put down the story on paper as completely as possible, and fix the writing as you revise and edit future drafts. It’s also been said that there is a point when you have to let a story go; there’s nothing left you can do with what you have. It’s better to have a good story that hasn’t quite reached it’s full potential than to have an over-polished turd.

But there’s one aspect of writing that falls between those two points that no one ever talks about. Sometimes the story changes so drastically during the drafting process that it becomes a different story. Entire characters are removed, events shifted in a new and exciting way. You have to rewrite.

A rewrite isn’t like a normal draft. You aren’t making the writing better, you’re making the story better. But this leaves you in an awkward position as a writer. Because you are well past the first draft, and you should be focused heavily on making the writing as good as possible. You’re also in the process of putting the story down for the first time again. You are stuck in this loop of dual mentalities, and it makes the entire thing a nightmare to think about. How can you go full force into the new story without worrying about writing if you are also focusing on making the writing good?

I find myself in that place right now, and it’s given me new insight into the writing habits of other authors. You see, I write chronologically: The story begins, events progress, and then it ends. I never understood how so many authors could write the ending first, or the middle. It didn’t make sense… until I found myself unable to rewrite my current project the way I normally do. The story has already progressed to the end in my mind. I just haven’t written it yet. And that means that I find myself trying to write whatever scene I find interesting at that moment, instead of recording it in order.

It’s like remembering your favorite scenes from a movie. You never remember the entire movie in order, despite having watched it that way. I get it now… and I don’t like it. My entire writing process has been turned on its head, and I have to relearn how to write all over again.

Plot Holes (Thoughts & Ideas)

A story is like a sweater. Fill it with enough holes and it falls apart, becoming worthless. It also requires a few holes to function though.

As a fiction writer your job is to tell a story. Your editor then marks the plot holes for you to see. (in addition to their other tasks) It’s your job as the storyteller to sew up the gaping holes and let a few minor ones stay. Because even in real life plot holes exist.

A plot hole isn’t a lack of something happening, or a lack of information. It’s a lack of explanation. The reader isn’t being told what they need to know. Sometimes this is easily avoided (explaining how the Maltese Falcon ended up in the hands of the villain), but other times it is unavoidable (you can’t feasibly explain a character’s complete life history).

Example:
The reader needs to know that the protagonist is in Paris, and why, but they don’t need to know how. How is unnecessary information within the context of the story, and thus can be skipped. It remains a plot hole, because information isn’t being shared, but it’s one the reader will overlook.

Many writers stress over the filling of plot holes. They pull out their hair trying to get rid of every single one. Other writers dig more plot holes as they rewrite, because they assume the reader will only care about what’s being written. Neither is a good approach.

You need to find a balance. Think like a reader as you read your story, and make note of the glaring holes that stand out. Have at least two others do the same, in addition to your editor looking for them. Now fill those in, as well as a few smaller ones. But leave a few small holes in your story. Unknown information adds a touch of realism, and allows for fan theories. (An integral part of the experience. The Pixar Theory is one of the greatest things I’ve ever read, with no basis in fact at all, yet it works because of plot holes and easter eggs.)

Serialized Fiction (Thoughts & Ideas)

In the olden days, they put on radio shows. These shows ran once a week for a brief period (30 minutes maybe), and then they ended with a cliffhanger to keep you excited for the next part. They were small parts to an incomplete story that would be told over months. This worked well, because it brought in more listeners to a fairly new medium of storytelling. It hooked you when you had nothing else to hook you. It was an uncontested method of delivering fiction to the masses.

Then TV tried its hand at storytelling in small time frames. It succeeded by offering small, self-contained stories that featured the same cast of characters. Occasionally they would follow a very loose, secondary story arc, but mostly they were just adventures in a world different from ours. It was a new way to tell stories that had to compete with radios and movies for an audience’s attention.

Television has evolved (for better or for worse) to a more narrative driven medium. A season now consists of a very important story arc over months of episodes, while mostly maintaining the self-contained story aspect in most episodes.

There have been serialized books for a long time now, but they were mostly for younger readers, and they followed the original TV formula. Recently though (since the boom of Independent Publishing) books have gotten the radio show treatment. Many people cite the benefits of “Serials” as being short and easy to read in an afternoon, or during a lunch break. Others have cited them as a waste of time, not having a complete story or coming out so far apart that they forget the series exists.

I think that we (as authors) have been approaching this from the wrong angle. Radio dramas worked because they didn’t have any real competition. In the modern world everything competes for your attention; other books, movies, TV shows, Youtube, facebook, Twitter, podcasts, you name it. Your potential audience needs a definitive reason to stick with your work.

For similar reasons, we can’t use the modern TV formula either. They’re too much like the radio dramas, in that they require you to tune in to every episode. So what’s left?

Old TV. It was a brilliant way to pull the attention away from other media. Produce a work that can be enjoyed every week, but that doesn’t take a lot of time. We should be applying this to books as well (Though not every book. I still believe in the strengths of full Novels.).

Write a story; a self-contained story; centered around the hero you’ve written. Make it short (under 40,000 words, but preferably closer to 20,000 words). Now write another one. And another. Weave in some over-arcing plot that ties them together. Use subtle hints and recurring side characters for this. Make the over-arcing plot simple and easy to follow even if a book or two is missed, because it is the secondary plot. This is your hook. This series, a true “Serial”, grabs readers and thrusts them into your writer’s mind. It introduces people who don’t normally read to you as an author. It hooks them, so that they can’t help but read your longer works.

Now write a novel, or a collection of short stories. Produce a work that takes more than an afternoon to read, and your fans will devour it. You will have more success as an author (studies have already begun to hint at this), but more importantly: You will create more readers in the world. You will improve the state of written fiction by introducing people who “don’t like to read” to longer fiction. You will make them want to read.

Authors shouldn’t be trying to split a novel into multiple parts for a quick cash grab. We shouldn’t be trying to solely cater to fans of bite-sized fiction. We should be using the tools at our disposal to expand the minds of those bite-sized fans, while still catering to them and fans of longer works. We should be trying to better our world through the stories we tell, and not worry about if we can pay rent from book sales. Because if we manage to improve the world, financial success will inevitably follow anyway.

Mastery of Your Craft (Thoughts & Ideas)

I just read something that made me stop and think. It was just 4 sentences on a website that is buried in a sea of more useful sites, but it was about motivation. One of those sentences mentioned that motivation is partially driven by our belief that we are constantly improving. Think about that for a second. It isn’t even the act of improving that keeps us doing what we love, but simply the belief that we are.

I can point out a dozen people I know who are terrible at something they are passionate about, yet they keep telling me how much better they’ve gotten. They are driven by a mastery of their craft, even if it’s imagined. We can apply that to our lives as well.

You see, since my debut novel released, I’ve felt like I’m hitting my head against a wall trying to write my next piece. I’ve lost all motivation to continue the series I started. It helps that people keep telling me how much they want to read the second book, but it isn’t enough to keep my head in that world for long. But I am motivated to write about a particular superhero I’ve created. A superhero whose adventures are aimed at a much younger audience.

While I’m sure that I’m improving at writing in general (I don’t believe we ever truly stop), it doesn’t feel like I’m improving at the storytelling aspect of that world. I do feel like I’m improving at YA fiction though, because it’s such a new side to writing for me. I’m sure if I sat down and worked on Horror or Romance, I’d improve drastically at those new avenues as well. They’re things that I’m not confident in doing yet.

And that’s the key. If I’m to truly buckle down and finish book 2 of my trilogy, I need to feel like I’m improving as I write it. I need to do something new and exciting with it. I’m not sure what that will be just yet, but I now understand why I’m having so much trouble.

This applies to anything we do. Do you find it hard to motivate yourself to mow the lawn? Try making shapes and patterns in the grass before you even it out. Need to pump yourself up about working the register at Wal-Mart? Try bagging the customers’ groceries in a different way (all cold together, alphabetically, etc.). Give yourself something new to improve upon. Eventually you will find yourself going back to your original method, but by then you’ll be a bit rusty and need to improve again.

Superhero Poll

There are three superheroes that dominate our media. Regardless of whether you like them or not, everyone can recognize the iconography of these three men. But why? What makes these three so pervasive in American culture? (And beyond really)

I’d like to take a poll of my readers, and anybody you know who likes superheroes. (Ask them for me) Of these three men; Batman, Spiderman, and Superman; which is your favorite? And why?

Is it the costume? The powers? The personality? Is it his personal rogue’s gallery? Perhaps a specific actor that brought him to life in your eyes? Or a particular story surrounding him?

Why him?