• Online Writing Community
  • Join
  • Pitch A Guest Post

The Writer's Dialog

Beyond Words...Let's Write a Novel

  • Home
  • About
  • Fiction
    • Unexpected Love
  • Positive Penning
    • Guest Posts
    • Book Reviews
  • More Than Words
  • Creative Writing Resources
    • Novelist by Night Let’s Write a Novel
    • Resources
    • Writing Prompts

Join Our Community Newsletter

Sign up to receive timely, useful information in your inbox.

Guest Post: Lessons From Novel No. 1

The One Thing We’ll Do in Novel No. 2

by: Whitney Jones and Julie Tyler

 Writing our first novels taught us each ONE BIG LESSON that we will carry into writing a second novel, and that we’re sharing exclusively with Writer’s Dialogue readers! We hope that you can learn from our mistakes so that your novel-writing experience is less… ahem… bumpy than ours!

Hi, this is Whitney and Julie–the gals who run the writing blog FromNothingToNovel. We’re friends from grad school, exercise enthusiasts, writing buddies, and (sound fanfare) debut novel writers!

We are currently on the hunt for literary agents (a process we write a bit about on our blog), but whatever happens, we’re most proud of the simple fact that we did it. We each wrote a debut novel. Whitney wrote a middle grade fantasy, and Julie an upmarket romance.

Phew! It was a wild adventure for both of us, which was full of discoveries, struggles, and triumphs.

Whitney’s One Big Lesson: Plotting and Planning

 I began writing my first novel a month or so after I defended my dissertation and the morning after an odd dream. I woke up and ran to my computer to capture the images before they dissipated into a pre-coffee fog. What I wrote was a dream, yes; but it was also a sort of love letter to the books and poetry I’d written about in my dissertation. This resulted in a story that was an unfocused mess.

It took a REALLY long time to get the draft from dreamy philosophy to an actual narrative structure. I had half of the novel written and had no idea what was going to happen in the second half. It wasn’t until I forced myself to write a novel synopsis, to actually organize and outline my plot, that the novel began to come together in any sort of comprehensible way.

I won’t fall victim to this little (read: HUGE) mistake again.

While I’ve already jotted down a few pages of action and dialogue for my second novel, I’m holding off on writing more until I figure out the actual plot outline. All I know right now is that I’m writing a contemporary adaptation of The Twelve Dancing Princesses for middle grade readers.

To take control of plot, structure, and pacing right away instead of waiting for them to develop on their own (what was I thinking?!), I’ve created a three-step plan, which I’m sharing with you guys!

  1. List my protagonist’s primary goal as well as small goals for each third of the
  2. Plan clear narrative action that helps my protagonist pursue her goal in each third of the novel.
  3. Identify how the protagonist’s emotional growth is influenced by the action and pursuit of goal in each third of the novel.

I don’t want my outline to get any more detailed than this because I like a little bit of wiggle room for my work to grow and develop organically. I suppose that’s a symptom of my fascination with coming-of-age stories. I like to see how protagonists grow and develop into who they were meant to be, and the same is true for the books I write.

~Whitney

 

Julie’s One Big Lesson: Voice

 My first novel sprung out of an interview I conducted with a close friend three years ago. After typing up interview notes, I started what I thought would be a straightforward process of bringing into being a narrative about two lovers from different cultures who put their ambition before their relationship. Although I imbued their romance with passion and conflict, I forgot to do ONE THING as I wrote:

Distinguish the Characters’ Voices From One Another.

 You’d think doing so would’ve been a no-brainer, given their differences, but no. I didn’t think at all about voice until 90 percent of the way in. What was the result?

  • One, the characters sounded bland and failed to draw readers in emotionally.
  • Two, they sounded like the same

Had it not been for feedback from readers and agents, my manuscript might still be a voiceless mess.

My second novel is about eight people, who share only one thing in common—a thyroid disorder. This time around, I’m pledging to work smarter to create distinct voices for each of them and hopefully save myself from a lot of writing pain.

Before I write a single scene, I’m going to go through these steps:

  1. Draw up a character profile for each main character: what’s his/her predicament, worldview, goal, age, gender, etc.
  2. Experiment with dialogue and narration for each character: what “voice” works best for each character?
  3. Add “voice” descriptions to each character profile: diction, catch phrases, ways of putting sentences together, tone,
  4. Try “voices” out in actual scenes and tweak as needed

At some point in the drafting process, the voices will become second nature and I’ll be able to set the character profiles aside. But knowing MORE about characters and creating VOICES consciously will lead to a less frustrating experience than I had with novel #1.

~Julie

 

BONUS LESSON: GET  THEE A WRITING BUDDY

But wait, there's more! The best parts of going through the writing 
process? Going through it together. And the best advice we could give any
new novel writer (or writer in general) would be to find a writing partner 
to share the experience.

We’ve spent hours reviewing each other’s scenes and chapters, exchanging feedback, discussing revisions, going back to our drafts, and incorporating what the other suggested. We even started our blog to explore the craft of writing fiction in more depth and connect with other novelists going through the same process.

Pretty much on a daily basis our Facebook IM exchanges look something like this:

“Girl, I think you should try X.”

“Alright.” [clackety clackety] “What d’ya think now? Is it better than before?” “Girl, yes.”

Without these impromptu conversations, plot and voice might still be plaguing our novel #1 manuscripts. So while we’ve each made a plan to avoid these issues in novel #2, others may crop up. What will we ues to arm ourselves? Our constant IMing system!

Like Writer’s Dialogue and their sister site 2 Elizabeths, we believe that writers need community, and we’d love to be part of yours. How can we help relieve your writing pain?

Creative Writing Resources// Guest Posts// Positive Penning// Uncategorized5 Comments

« Discipline Is Not A Dirty Word – Let’s Set SMARTER Goals
Writing Prompts September 20, 2017 »

Leave a Reply

5 Comments on "Guest Post: Lessons From Novel No. 1"

Notify of
avatar
wpdiscuz_captcharefresh

avatar
wpdiscuz_captcharefresh

Sort by:   newest | oldest | most voted
walzel1960
Author
walzel1960
Share On FacebookShare On TwitterShare On GoogleShare On VKontakte

Whitney, Julie,
Thank you so much for this wonderful guest post. It is full of amazing information and great advice for writers. I look forward to our continued relationship. You are both amazing and gifted writers. We are lucky to have you.

Vote Up0Vote Down  Reply
3 years 5 months ago
Whitney Jones
Guest
Whitney Jones
Share On FacebookShare On TwitterShare On GoogleShare On VKontakte

Thank you so much for inviting us to post! We’ve enjoyed working with you and we love what you’re doing over here at Writer’s Dialogue!

Vote Up0Vote Down  Reply
3 years 5 months ago
RB Frank
Guest
RB Frank
Share On FacebookShare On TwitterShare On GoogleShare On VKontakte

Hi Whitney and Julie- thanks for the tips. I tend to be a panster which is weird because I plan almost everything else. But then again I hate paper with lines because it tells me where to write😂
As far as voice, I find it helps me to picture the characters as if I were watching my own movie and the voices kind of evolve on their own.
Maybe I’ll try planning and see what happens. 😏

Vote Up1Vote Down  Reply
3 years 5 months ago
Whitney Jones
Guest
Whitney Jones
Share On FacebookShare On TwitterShare On GoogleShare On VKontakte

Hi, RB Frank! Whitney here. I love the idea of picturing the characters as if they are in a movie and envy your ease with voice development! I have to make lists of character motivations, background, and everything else including the kitchen sink to get a grip on my characters’ voices! We all have our strengths, but voice is not mine. 🙂 I’ll have to try your movie strategy on my WIP. Be sure to stop by fromnothingtonovel.com to let us know how you planning goes!

Vote Up0Vote Down  Reply
3 years 5 months ago
walzel1960
Author
walzel1960
Share On FacebookShare On TwitterShare On GoogleShare On VKontakte
That sounds very much like me, RB. When I am developing my characters, I picture them as people, in my mind’s eye: their attitudes, personalities, looks, etc. The voice comes from all of those characteristics, however their attitudes and personalities are primary factors involved in developing their tone. I have a really terrific Character Description Sheet that I like to use, and you have just given me an idea for a future article that I will include in a later issue…so thank you, RB, for your thoughts. This is exactly the type of conversation we would like to see happen… Read more »
Vote Up2Vote Down  Reply
3 years 5 months ago
wpDiscuz

Elizabeth


Welcome to A Special Online Writing Community:  The Writer’s Dialog! Together, we can Share our Work and provide encouragement to assist writers in achieving goals.

Recent Posts

  • Writing Prompts September 20, 2017
  • Guest Post: Lessons From Novel No. 1
  • Discipline Is Not A Dirty Word – Let’s Set SMARTER Goals
  • Writing Resources: Building Metaphors
  • Writing Prompts

Contact Us

  • Email
    Elizabeth@writersdialog.com

Socialize

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Twitter

Archives

  • September 2017
  • August 2017
  • July 2017
  • June 2017

Recent Comments

  • Whitney Jones on More Than Words – Share Your Work
  • Whitney Jones on Guest Post: Lessons From Novel No. 1
  • Lauri Smith on More Than Words – Share Your Work
  • Lauri Smith on More Than Words – Share Your Work
  • Lauri Smith on More Than Words – Share Your Work

Creative Writing

Let’s Write a Novel

Online Writing Community

Copyright © 2021 · Savory theme by Restored 316