posted
I'm a new writer with a good idea for a SF/fantasy multiverse, daunted by the size of my idea and word counts others mention with many zeros on the end. I'm also a slow and inexperienced writer, taking about an hour a page on English assignments that have never gone higher than a handful of pages.
Now I知 200 words into the first novel of what it looks like will be a trilogy. But I can稚 seem to progress with the plot until I understand how the world/universe/multiverse works. I keep getting bogged down with details like how transportation works, details that would drastically affect the rest of the book. I enjoy thinking about all this, but how long do I need to spend preparing my idea before writing it down (other than in notes)?
I知 afraid that, if I just start writing freely, the story will butterfly out of control and be drastically different from what I intended. I know that can be part of the creative process, but here I am trying to create a convincing, consistent multiverse, not a fantasy with Star Trek-quality science/magic/mechanics.
And I知 hoping that writing will speed up the more I know what I知 doing. Or else I値l never finish.
posted
Preparing the idea is the hardest part. It takes the longest amount of time, but it needs to be done.
While you're getting all those thoughts together, you might also want to consider cobbling together a rough outline of where you want to go throughout this 3-book epic.
When you've done all the preparation, you will have no choice but to sit down and WRITE.
posted
If you want to work out an original, self-consistent universe (I don't like the term "multi-verse", as it is an inherent contradiction), then do that. Feel free to write stories about this or that part of your universe before you've got absolutely everything worked out. Don't put off taking notes about things that you've worked out till you have a grand theory of everything, you can always go back and change your notes, but you can't necessarily remember something if you forget it.
Posts: 8322 | Registered: Aug 1999
| IP: Logged |
quote: the story will butterfly out of control and be drastically different from what I intended.
Isn't that the definition of writing? I love when that happens!
Seriously though. You need to know the rules of your world. If you have magic, it has to work in certain ways and those ways have to be consistent. There have been a couple of threads on magic systems on the board. Check them out.
If the laws of physics are different from what we know, you need to know how they are different and how that impacts your world.
Do the prep until you are comfortable with what you think you need to know about the world for story X and then write. You will find out other things that you couldn't have known in advance that you needed to address as you go but if you have done your planning, the answers should be easier.
posted
I think it took JK Rowling six YEARS to get her first book written. She has loads and loads and loads of notes, including lists of students who haven't even been mentioned in the books, all kinds of spells and animals and other stuff. All that prep work is one of the factors in her being able to create such a believable and rich universe for Harry and his friends. If that's the way your story needs to be, go for it! But don't stifle the writing itself with such demands. Get the prep work in your head and then just turn your fingers loose on the keyboard and let the story become whatever it will be. Letting the characters take over the story is one of the joys of writing, for me, at least.
posted
Years? Oh boy! Rowling's "Quidditch Through the Ages" and "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them" come to mind. I'm taking copious notes, and hoping I can keep up with this every day. Beginning to realize that once I define my world and characters, the story will write itself. Thanks for the moral support!
Posts: 36 | Registered: Jan 2007
| IP: Logged |
posted
Remember, the first book, you're still figuring out how everything works, and how to write. That's why first books often take a long time. Also, no deadline on the first book.
Posts: 2 | Registered: Aug 2010
| IP: Logged |
posted
Like yourself, I am a new writer, with pretty much no previous experience. I started writing a novella, which I guess has grown into a novel. With little to no research, I began writing my story. As I wrote, I found valuable information on this site, at the library, on the internet, pretty much anywhere I could get it. While what I have learned has been invaluable, learning it later has posed a major challenge and added to a lot of editing that might not have been required. If I ever do it again, I would definitely research what I am planning on writing about and create an outline, character bible's, and plenty of things I have yet to have learned. On a smaller, simpler scale than that of a fantasy universe and its transportation, I had to create a character and her surrounding village. As I wrote, I was constantly having to rewrite parts of the story when architecture or customs/fashion, etc did not fit with the tale. What I did in this case, (I was creating a new minority tribe in China) I found a documented case on a real tribe - erased all of their specifics, but kept the headings (climate, customs, dress, diet, etc) and let the creative juices flow. This was quite helpful with preparing a well-rounded description of the tribe and the child's background. I also drew a picture of the kid and the village she was from - hoping that this would help with descriptions and believable statements. And, one of the best parts, if something changed in the book, I would lie in bed at night, close my eyes and change the mental image of whatever the situation was and try to put it into words the following day. My outline was written in about ten minutes (the idea was more or less played out in my mind). This was because I didn't really know how to write one and was too lazy to. So, most of the writing and story line grew and stretched from day to day - characters changing, places shifting, cultures evolving, etc. I really do enjoy just letting the creative juices flow and will now spend the next ten years or cleaning it up! Have an overgrown, mutated beast sitting within my laptop and not quite sure if she's fit for a bookshelf or a toilet spool! Good luck with your story!
Posts: 12 | Registered: Oct 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
By the way, sorry for the long, drawn-out post. Have had a few mojitos, hoping Hemingway's favorite Cuban drink would stimulate the literary juices. Apparently not, having found myself on this site and not writing. But, the drink sure is tasty!
Posts: 12 | Registered: Oct 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
I guess everyone has a different method, or methods, which work comfortably for them. I understand that Stephen King likes to discover his story like an archeologist going straight in and finding out what he's discovering at the very end. Personally this method means nothing but writer's block.
I have written two novels and I'm working on a third. Generally I spend 3/4 of a year developing everything, environment, characters, plot events, all of it. Then I outline scene by scene and write the thing for the remaining 1/4 of the year. This system has worked phenomenally for me.
posted
It was King's method that made me realize I was going about it in the wrong way (for me). I have tried the outlines before and always met with the same result: a complete unwillingness to follow through with the actual writing of the story.
When writing first tickled my fancy, I acquired a post board, thumbtacks, and a lot of 3x5s. I had my intial story idea and from there I created my characters and wrote their quirks down and explained where they were coming from. When I got to the actual scene-by-scene plot outline, I realized the desire to write that particular story had worn off (possibly due to all of this boring technical work that makes writing a book seem like building a skyscraper). I also have a tendency to think up great concepts but no great endings to those great concepts.
I began writing my first novel with the whole National Novel WriMo thing. I didn't win, but I'm still trudging along with it. Only slightly beyond the 50k mark (thank YOU month of December and all the joys that you bring). Didn't use an outline. Just started writing and let the story evolve on its own steam (which probably amounts to Jack). Of course, as I was writing I knew vaguely where the story would end up. The outline was/is kept inside my head and was pulled up only when I reached a particular destination in the writing ("Oh, so the protagonist has reached this point in the story--now what's going to be the next destination point he must reach?").
This, I think, is King's method. And to be frank, King's books are slower than Helen Keller and many times their endings leave a lot to be desired. It's like a boulder being rolled down a hill (not a very steep one). There's only one place for it to go. They don't twist very often (not in the Shyamalan sense of the word, at least) and they end up as large, sprawling pieces of straight-forward work.
But you know. It's made the man millions. This is a useless addition to this thread, so I will try to impart some obvious advice: If plotting out every single aspect of the story beforehand doesn't work for you, just plunge ahead without it and see how that goes. This probably doesn't work with world-building fantasy epics. Darn that Tolkien and his precedent-setting!
Printer-friendly view of this topic
