But, where to start?

I’ll bet many of you have been toying with the idea of writing a novel. And if you’re anything like I was before I wrote my first book, you have no idea where to start. The thought of writing a novel is so fantastic, at least to me, but the fact that it can be overwhelming is quite an understatement.

Before I began writing my first book, I had no idea where to start. So, I started at the beginning. I took pen to paper and wrote the first page. Can I admit that it was dreadfully bad? Not only was what I wrote completely lame, but you don’t usually start a book on page one without direction.

Then Where Do We Start if Not Page One?

Well, of course, you start on page one, but that’s not literally what I meant. There are many other things to do before you even begin to write. Here’s a list of things to consider before you start to write the book, which in my opinion, is the “easier” part. Writing is rarely easy, but it is much more smooth to begin writing once you’ve planned out some things first. Here’s what I mean.

Before you write that first page, first consider:

• A few paragraphs on your book idea. Write two or three paragraphs that say what will happen in the beginning of the book, in the middle, and the end. Once you do that, then…
• Write your book premise in three sentences. You need to know where the book is headed. If you don’t, then that leaves the middle part of the book, the most difficult part to write, boring as all get out. Throughout the story, your characters need to grow and change. That’s called the character arc. Without one, the book will fall flat.
• Now, it’s time to do a general outline of the book. It doesn’t matter whether you’re a pantser (fly by the seat of your pants without direction) or a plotter (plot every part of your book until you know everything that is going to happen). I’m somewhere in the middle of those two, but I still know what is going to happen in the beginning, middle, and end if nothing more.
• Continuing on the outline topic, click here for how to create a strong story structure. It’ll give you the basics of outlining. Search around the blog for more articles on ideas on how to outline.
• After you have a decent outline in which you are satisfied, then you need to know everything about your protagonist and antagonist, at the very least. Here’s why. Take a person you know well and think about all the ways you’d describe them to someone whose never met them. You’d be able to define them quite well. Now, what about someone you’ve met once. Could you describe them to someone else with the same depth as a person you know well? Nope! Well, it’s the same for your main characters. How can you write about people you don’t know inside and out? Click for articles on creating a great protagonist and antagonist.
• Once you know your main characters inside and out, then you’re going to want to plot out your chapter so their is never a point in your book where you run out of ideas. When that happens, your book goes flat and readers will put that book down in favor of another. We definitely don’t want that to happen. Click here for how to plot chapters (scenes).

Alright, so there is more to writing a novel than this, but this should get you started. Stay tuned for part two of this article which will continue with guidance on how to get your book from page one to published.

Happy Writing! Gina

If you wouldn’t mind, drop me a line and let me know if this was helpful and if you have any questions that I can help you with along your writing journey.