Tag: How to write a novel

Writing Fantasy || Point of View

Whose Point Of View Matters Most In Your Story?

The answer to this question will play an important role in the tone of your entire novel. We listen to other people probably every day in one form or another, in personal conversations, a lecture at school, a boss or characters on a TV show. Notice how the tone of their voice influences you. What tone do you want to convey in a particular scene or throughout the entire story?

  • Interesting
  • Funny
  • Lively
  • Friendly
  • Romantic
  • Quarrelsome

The characters telling the story have their own unique voice and, depending on that voice, will tell a scene in a specific way.

8 Points to Ponder when Writing Point Of View. Writing tips.

8 Points To Ponder For Point Of View

  • Have you thought about what tense you’ll write in? Will your story read better in past tense or present tense? Past Tense – “Suzie shopped at the mall”.
  • Present Tense – “Suzie is shopping at the mall”.
  • When you sit to write each scene, who do you hear talking in your mind?
  • First Person – “I love doughnuts”.
  • Second Person – “You love doughnuts”.
  • Third Person – “Suzie loves doughnuts”.
  • Omniscient (aka, all-knowing) – “Suzie loves doughnuts but she doesn’t realize they’re laced with a powerful hallucinogenic”. Use this voice sparingly, as when none of the characters knows something but your reader needs to know it.

 

Choose Your Narrators

Just like in a movie audition, test your characters’ voices to see which point of view sounds best for each scene. You may want to do several viewpoints throughout your story, but remember to not switch viewpoints in the middle of a scene or chapter unless you make a specific break in the narrative. It confuses the heck out of the reader. If you’re new to writing fantasy/fiction keep it simple and write one POV for each scene. You may feel like you want to write the entire story from one POV, but test other voices to see if you can spice things up, add some humour or simply add a different perspective to delight the reader.

 

Voice Test for POV

Write a paragraph from the author’s POV. This means you just write out the paragraph as it happens, without emotion or opinion. Then write it out in all the voices of your characters who are in that scene. Let them say what they feel and what they’re thinking.

  • Who sounds good for this particular scene?
  • Who has an emotional investment in what’s happening?
  • Who will it influence later in the story as your plot unfolds?
  • Who sees something no one else does?

 

Example:

  • “Suzie went to the mall again. I hope she’s not spending all her money. She still has two weeks before her next paycheck”.
  • “She went to the mall again. Who does she think she is, buying all those fancy expensive clothes? They look ridiculous on her anyway.”
  • “Suzie went to the mall this morning. She needed to choose a dress for her grandmother’s funeral”.

Do you see how each character changes the tone of the scene? What were they thinking and feeling? Ask them why. Draw the scene out from your chosen character’s point of view.

Til next time, know you are loved by the One who created you in His image.

Lynne

 

Resources to check out

Back To The Future – where the twists are revealed by other people’s POV and by the main character.

 

 

 

Writing Fantasy || Society

Who Lives In Your Fantasy World?

We have the freedom to create an entirely new world from our own imagination! How amazing is that? We get to decide everything that happens in this world and who lives there. We’ve already decided what our world looks like. Now we’re going to decide how our world works so we can write a society for our fantasy characters to live in.

fantasy-society-lynne-collier-blog
art by kellepics

 

Your World’s Society, Technology & History

Before you can create your characters you’ll need to know what goes on in the world around them and how they fit into this world. However, if you’ve already drawn up an extensive list of characters and decided what they eat for breakfast, no problem, don’t waste all that creativity, just build the society around them and let it unfold from there.

Here are some things to consider about your world:

Social Norms

  • What kind of work do they do?
  • What significant events have shaped the history of this world?
  • What’s their educational system like?
  • Do they own businesses or trades?
  • Are there male and female or children and how do they develop?
  • What religious beliefs are in play? How do they worship? Write down some of their moral values.
  • Is there a law enforcement system? How is it run?
  • Is it a democratic society, dictatorship or monarchy?
  • How do they communicate? Is there more than one language?
  • What about transportation?
  • How do your characters communicate long distance?
  • What do they do for fun
  • Does your world run on electricity, steam or natural resources?
  • Are there warring factions?
  • What are their weapons?

 

Ask Yourself, “If This Is True, Then What Needs To Happen?”

• If characters go to work in cities, then where do they live?
• If they live in high-rise buildings, then how do they get to the top floors?
• If by elevators, then how are they powered?
• If by electrical power, then how is it generated?
• If by water, how is it produced?
• If by rain, how is it stored?
• …

You get the idea. Here we have characters that live in high-rise buildings where they get to their apartments by taking an elevator which is powered by electricity produced by water which is held in reservoirs outside of the city.

You can go on from there, filling in the “If This, Then What..?” questions until all the questions about your characters’ needs are met in their world. You only need the details that are relevant to the characters. There’s no need to write lengthy, unnecessary descriptions which aren’t relevant to your story and will only bore your readers. You just need to know how they do what they do.

Remember to show this in your writing, don’t tell it. (More on this later).
You may need to go back and add transportation routes, such as wide rivers and ports for boats, roads for trades’ people, or something like train tracks to your world map — grab the cheat. Add any changes as you write your story so you don’t forget the details.

The easiest way to figure this out is to put yourself in the shoes (hairy feet, hooves) of your characters. Walk around in your world as if you were there and see what you need.

Have fun!  #writingfantasy

Til next time, know you are loved by the One who created you in His image.

Lynne

Writing Fantasy || 6 Creative Elements

6 Creative Elements of Writing Fantasy

Apart from the actual storyline, our writing needs to include other elements in order to hold our reader’s attention. Look for ways to incorporate some of the things you find interesting and entertaining when you read a novel or watch a movie. What you find interesting will come through in your own writing.

Adding creative elements to your story will capture your reader's attention and keep them hooked.

Add These Elements to Your Stories and You’ll Grab Your Reader’s Attention

  • Humour
  • Romance
  • Relationships
  • Plot Twists
  • Fights
  • Chases

What Are 4 Of Your Favourite Books or Movies and Why?

This is an exercise in finding creative elements for your novels. You’ll write best what you enjoy most because it will come easier. Your story will take on a life of its own as you write so let it flow naturally and don’t think about getting it perfect the first time. You’ll probably find that you automatically write the elements you’re attracted to and, if humour is one of your favourite elements, go ahead and laugh out loud. If anyone’s listening and asks you what you’re laughing about, tell them they’ll just have to wait for the launch date.

As you read through your first draft later, look for lapses in your storyline and see if you can add more of your favourite elements. Creative elements also serve to bridge the gaps between scenes and break up long dialogue. Have you ever noticed how some movies are good at throwing in humour right in the middle of a battle scene? One of my favourite franchises for this is the Avengers. Iron Man is always cracking me up right before he clobbers someone!

the-avengers-movie-release-poster-2012

Writing Creative Elements in Fantasy

How do you write humour, for example, into fantasy? I love the movie Guardians of the Galaxy, where misunderstanding of the English language stumps the character Drax through the entire movie, but the movie is packed with other elements such as adventure, romance, battle scenes and chases. And let’s not forget Groot! He doesn’t say much, but that’s half the humour. And who doesn’t love to see the baby Groot dancing? Remember to show, don’t tell. The key to making your story memorable is to engage your audience. Be yourself and your own voice will use creative elements naturally.

220px-Guardians_of_the_Galaxy_Vol_2_poster from the blog by Lynne Collier

Til next time, know you are loved by the One who created you in His image.

Lynne

Resources

The Avengers movies

Guardians of the Galaxy movie

 

 

Switching Focus

My next blog was going to be about compiling a playlist to inspire you as you write your fantasy novel. Instead, I’m letting you, my fellow bloggers, know I’m switching my focus on this site. I’ll let you know how you can still read the playlist post later.

Switching Focus
New Path

#WritingFantasy  Will Carry On

I’ve completed the series of posts I wanted to share with you about Writing Fantasy and the steps I’ve taken on my own journey writing my first fantasy novel. I’m very excited to start the actual writing process this November for my second NaNoWriMo! If you’ve followed my posts over the past few months I hope you’ll join me in November as we fire out 50,000 words together.

My Outline, Setting, Characters, World Building and Premise are all going to be relocated to another blog I write on, White Rose Writers.

So What’s My New Focus? #AmWriting

As most of you know from reading my profile, as well as being a writing coach I’m also a Christian Life Coach and Certified Lay Pastoral Counselor with many years experience coaching and encouraging believers in their walk with God. This will be my main focus on this blog going forward.

I’ll be blogging about Your Sacred Path, Finding Your Life Purpose, Hearing God’s Voice, Choosing Careers and possibly sharing a few gardening tips along the way. I love to network so I’ll be giving you links whenever I can for you to explore further.

My newsletter will be about the books and courses I’ll be writing, plus I’ll let you know when I’m launching something new, and I’ll have giveaways and social media events exclusively for my blog readers. If you choose to continue following me here that would be lovely, if however, you’re interested in continuing to follow my posts on writing, head over to White Rose Writers and follow my posts there, along with branding and marketing tips from my social media partner, Kirstie Shanks.

Thank you for taking time out from your busy life to read and comment.

Till next time here, or at White Rose Writers, I hope you are blessed.

Lynne

Writing Fantasy || Conflict

Writing Conflict Into Your Novel

So you have a nice fantasy/fiction story going on and you have a happy ending. Guess what? We’re going to turn that all upside down now! Get ready to throw your readers a curveball and upset the apple cart. Every story needs conflict – even children’s stories. Think about it. Where would Little Red Riding Hood be without the big bad wolf? We all love a villain to hate.

Writing Conflict
Little Red Riding Hood and the Fox

 

10 Things To Consider Before Writing Conflict

Some elements to think about as you write the outline of your conflict.

  1. What motivates both your hero and the villain so they’re drawn into the upcoming conflict?
  • Love
  • Greed
  • Pride
  • Anger
  • Duty
  • Other ideas…

 

  1. What keeps your hero and villain locked together in this conflict?
  • Past History
  • Jealousy
  • Mutual Love Interest
  • Loss of Someone or Something
  • Misunderstanding
  • Other ideas…

12 Key Elements On Writing Conflict

Your hero tries to understand what just happened in the inciting event and what it means to them and their way of life. This is the start of Act 2.

  1. Reveal the power of the antagonist (villain) and the true nature of the conflict arising.
  2. The hero begins to recognize what’s at stake and searches for ways to fight the battle.
  3. Your hero recognizes the true reason behind the conflict.
  4. With new knowledge and understanding, your hero gains headway in the conflict.
  5. Foreshadows Act 3 (sets up the base for what’s coming next) and reminds the hero what’s at stake. (We’ll look at foreshadowing more later).
  6. Your hero rallies everything they’ve got and launches it against the enemy with a seeming
  7. A defeat for your hero after the seeming victory in Act 2. This begins Act 3.
  8. The hero questions their goal, commitment and choices. They begin to doubt themselves and their ability to win the battle.
  9. Your hero comes face to face with the enemy.
  10. The next event is a duel to the death for the hero and the villain. This can be physically or metaphorically. The reader needs to be kept on the edge of their seat here because they know one or the other will lose.
  11. The hero wins and the conflict is ended.
  12. The ending of your story should give the reader ‘breathing space’ and ease them into the hero’s new reality.

 

Watch a favourite movie – it doesn’t need to be fantasy – and see how the conflict escalates and is resolved.

 

 Til next time, know you are loved by the One who created you in His image.

Lynne

 

Resources

The Hobbit -The Battle of the Five Armies

Maleficent

Divergent