Write It Wise: Map Your Novel Before It Maps You

Essay #4 — Map Your Novel. Chapter 30 of The Complete Handbook of Novel Writing, by the editors of Writer’s Digest

When you see the Southern Cross for the first time

You understand now why you came this way.

Cuz the truth you might be runnin’ from is so small

But it’s as big as the promise, the promise of a comin’ day.

~ Crosby, Stills and Nash, Southern Cross (1982)

When four people team up to write one song, you know a lot planning has gone into creating it. The quality of that plan shines when the song is sung in three-part harmony.

How well you plan out your novel will shine when somebody reads it.

The Complete Handbook of Novel Writing, by the Editors of Writer’s Digest, is chock-a-block full of great quotes and advice from authors and agents of all stripes. I love posting their words of wisdom for you!

So far in my essays, I’ve spent most of my time in Part Two of The Handbook, which is entitled The Writing Process. It’s the part where — once I had reached it and read it — I finally realized that within me, there was an author waiting to be born.

And it’s quotes like these that encourage me!

Words Of Wisdom

“I succeeded as a writer because I didn’t come out of an English Department. If I had, the prof would have congratulated me on my talent, and then showed me how Joyce or Hemingway would have handled the same elements better. The prof would have placed me in competition with the greatest writers of all time, and that would have ended my career.”

~ Kurt Vonnegut

“When I start on a book, I’ve been thinking about it and making notes for some time. So I have lots of theme, locale, subjects and technical ideas. It’s amazing how the subconscious works on these things! I don’t worry about long periods of not doing anything, for I know my subconscious is busy.“

~Arthur C. Clarke

N.M. Kelby and the Craft of Mapping

Award-winning novelist N.M. Kelby teamed up with the editors of Writer’s Digest to pen Chapter 30 for us in their most wonderful handbook on novel writing. But did you know that she’s also written a well-received self-help book of her own?

The Constant Art of Being a Writer, starts with the journey of discovering your voice, which we all know is very important! She then goes on to list the skills you need to express yourself with confidence and clarity, both when writing a novel and — most importantly! — when it comes time to market yourself and your book.

So check it out! It’s worth a read!

Building on Weisner’s Foundations

Ms Kelby cares enough about our craft to have taken the time to write Chapter 30 for us—Map Your Novel. In it, she builds on the fine work of Karen Weisner from the previous chapter, where, as you may recall from my last essay, we learned how to pick a genre, choose a point of view, and craft a blurb that doesn’t sound like you begged ChatGPT to write it for you. She also introduced the concept of Story Sparks — the flares that light your plot’s fuse.

So, before we chart Ms Kelby’s course, let’s detour briefly back to Ms Weisner and discuss how Goals and Motivation grow naturally from those Sparks.

Once you’ve sketched your Sparks onto the Checklist, take a few minutes to explain to yourself how they link together — and, crucially, how they push the story forward. Then jot down notes about how you’ll foreshadow those pivotal moments. Your future self will thank you for it (and possibly buy you a drink).

Do that much, and you’ll watch your story blossom before your very eyes.

I promise — it’ll be beautiful. Probably even award-winning-adjacent.

Who’s Who in Your Story?

Karen Weisner then suggests you ask of yourself:

“Who is the Hero? Who’s the Villain? The Victim? The Foil? The Advisor? What are the ways in which each of these characters views the world that is different? How do they view things the same? How do they sound when they talk — to themselves and to others? How do they see other people? How are they seen by others?”

~Karen Weisner… I literally told you above

Remember, there’s always room to wiggle. Ideas like these don’t need to be carved in stone (clay will do just fine).

Still, we do need some of our key players fleshed out ahead of time, for every good novel has them. Once we’ve set up our Sparks and aligned our characters, we can then frame them in an appropriate setting and firm up their Goals and Motivations.

Inside-Out Storybuilding

Notice how Ms. Weisner suggests that Goals and Motivations come last when constructing a Novel. That’s because, unlike when building a house — where you work from the outside in — an author builds from the inside out.

If you’re unsure about what your story contains: who the Characters are, what the Settings is, and how the Conflict ignites the Sparks — your novel will end up feeling contrived.

Building from the outside in gives you a hollow shell of a story: one whose only purpose is to achieve the Goal, with no sense of why that Goal matters, why the Hero must be the one to pursue it, or why the Villain must be the one to oppose it.

The How and the Why and the What of it all is far more important to a story than the actual achievement of the Goal. For you see, the story will end once the Goal is achieved, and all the Sparks, Conflicts and Motivations start falling away. Yet these are the very things you want your reader to remember — to fawn over and dream about, to return to long after they’ve closed the book.

So you must make them sing! (Preferably in tune). In three part harmony!

Know Your Ending Before You Start

Okay! Now your Checklist is complete! We have both a Single Sentence Blurb — and at least one other of a longer sort — along with the Sparks and the Main Characters, and the Setting and the Conflict. That means it’s time to get to the fun part: the Goals and Motivations of each Main Character!

This is where Chapter 30 — Map Your Novel — comes in handy. Penned by N.M. Kelby, she credits Arthur Miller with saying:

‘If I see an ending, I can work backwards.’

So let’s address that.

Ms. Kelby’s chapter is very short. It has only two subtitles; KNOW YOUR ENDING BEFORE YOU START and OUTLINE YOUR STORY SIMPLY AND BRIEFLY.

You see, she made her name in short stories before turning to novels, and this chapter plays to that forte.

“Of course the most difficult part of writing a story is ending it,”

~ Ms. Kelby responding to Arthur Miller.

She also says not to write a ‘purse-string’ ending, where all the loose bits and bobs are bundled up neat and tidy.

Nothing says Hack! worse than that!

Instead, Kelby advises that when you reach your ending, “Give them a whisper, a dream, and send them on their way.” Leave your readers wanting more, and they’ll follow you anywhere — no matter what story you write next.

Make It About More Than One Thing

This is sound advice. In fact, she spends most of her time in this chapter discussing this topic. She also quotes Tony Earley as saying, “A story is about one thing, and then another thing.”

Question for you: What in the heck does that mean?

Well, it means this:

Yes, of course your story is about the Goals and Motivations of your characters, and the Conflicts they resolve. But is that all there is? Surely not. A novel is also about how those characters grow — or fail to. Perhaps you wish to slip in a message, a warning, a moral, or a lesson. Maybe it’s about the foibles of the human race, the misgivings of misplaced honour, or how honest effort can still make things better. Or perhaps it’s about fate tightening its noose and grinning while it does so.

The possibilities are endless!

If you want your novel to have a fighting chance at greatness, make sure it’s about more than just one thing. Two or three are better. And leave at least one of these endings slightly open — just a crack! — enough leave your readers wanting more.

So diversify! That’s the key! You’re investing a lot of time in this! Make it count!

Outline the Bones

In the second half of her contribution to The Handbook, Ms. Kelby suggests creating a chapter-by-chapter outline. Even if you’re a Pantser like me, at some point in time you must outline your story, as an agent will demand it, along with the first fifty pages of your draft. They need this information so that they can properly pitch your novel to a prospective publisher.

She calls this the ‘bones’ of your story more often than she calls it an ‘outline.’ She also suggests a catchy title for each one of the chapters, to entice a speed reader (like me!) Ms. Kelby cites J.K. Rowling as an example of this necessity, and suggests that you offer a brief explanation in the ‘bones’ of your story as to why the titles are catchy, or what happens in each chapter.

You also must be able to explain — Again! In the briefest and clearest manner! — what bits of a chapter relate to the Action, to the Motivation and/or the Plot, and how they further Character development.

We get a very cool little ‘Litmus Test’ worksheet at the end of this chapter, to help us see if our Big Idea has what it takes to be a novel. The test is meant to inspire us, and to make us dream.

So let’s take it!

The Litmus Test

One: What’s the most important element of your Big Idea?

Since I can’t answer these questions for you, what I’ll do instead is talk about some Big Ideas I have had, and have woven into — as Ms. Kelby likes to call them — the ‘bones’ of a novel.

Over the course of my time at being a writer, I’ve had my best stories come to me as dreams while I slept. I must admit, the first time it happened, it literally blew me out of bed.

I immediately sat down and wrote several thousand words of what can only be described as enthusiastic gibberish — which I nowadays more affectionately call Monkey Bangings — about my most precious novel, a Sci-Fi Tragedy entitled C.A.R.O.L.I.N.

And what was the most important element of this novel?

Well, besides the obvious fact that I dreamt it while I slept, the most important element was how someday, someone’s going to write a computer program who/that ‘thinks‘ it’s a person. And what a horror that would be! I mean, can you imagine? I’m pretty sure that I can speak for all of us when I say that we believe we’re alive — that we’re living, breathing human beings.

It would be a horror to find out that we’re not. And that’s my story-dream’s Big Idea.

Two: Who are the minor Characters?

And not just, like, their names and faces, but who they really are. Their physical appearance, and how they sound when they talk. Their own goals and motivations, perhaps unrelated to the story.

The second story-dream I had was my series of seven Light Novels called DOTS. And as I pondered how to write it (as dreams don’t come with scripts) I realized the best way forward was with a mighty cast. My Hero needed all the help he could get, because he didn’t believe in himself. So he needed other people to prove to him and convince him that he was destined for greatness.

This soon became daunting. Not only were my Monkey Bangings for this story a mishmosh of Goals and Motivations, but I sometimes had a hard time remembering who was saying or doing what.

So, I created a list of very specific words to use only when a particular character appeared. Each got their own set of unique nouns and modifiers, catchphrases, and mannerisms—a way of talking, thinking, acting, dressing, or moving. Quirks and habits that made it obvious that, no matter where in the story they appeared, the text itself clearly identified who that person was..

Three: Where and when does the story take place?

This is very important! And it should be set in stone! Nothing grounds a good story better than having a unique setting; one specifically tailored to meet your goals as the author.

The plot was very murky in another story-dream of mine, that exists in part at this moment as a short story called The Donkey (and of course, a whole lot of Monkey Bangings!) The people in this dream acted very odd. They were stand-offish towards the Main Characters. Not impolite — sometimes they were too polite! — but they treated them as outsiders, and looked upon them as cattle.

These people had so many quirks. Odd ways of behaving and weird habits. Not the least of which was that no one would tell you their name. They were offended if you asked them for it, and would never ask you for yours, nor ever call you by it. It just wasn’t in their nature.

I had to think long and hard about where such odd behaviour would be thought of as the norm. And since I mostly write Sci-Fi, I figured these people had to live somewhere far away, on a world all by themselves. So I gave them their own planet, and their story opened up to me. Cultures, beliefs, tenets, ideals — with an entire planet to dwell upon. I found myself free to stuff it full of every odd-ball habit and quirk I wanted.

Thus, the setting for The Donkey is now cast in stone. It takes place on SPARTAX, where everyone is a genius, and no one will tell you their name.

Four: What are some possible minor conflicts, or perhaps side stories?

It’s time to think about some events that might happen, given the characters you’ve created. Flesh them out in the Setting you have chosen, with beliefs, acts, and ideals that can define them.

If you don’t know this about me yet, let me say it here: I write episodically, not epically (we’ll talk more about those words in a future essay). As such, my setting for an episodic anime I call The VocaLords is, of course, set in stone. So far, I’ve written one episode, with the intent to write at least three more. To keep it interesting, I have to fill each episode with fresh ideas and new adventures.

That much is a given. But what I must also do is grow my characters, and show sides of them that up until this point in time, I have not yet shown. This will make them seem more real, as they’ll become more than what they are right now, and more important to the story.

A good reader friend of mine on Royal Road posted a Comment to me on the first episode of my story called The VocaLords:

“It gave me something to expect and then went ‘You thought that, eh? How about this instead?'”

I told him I was gonna have that printed on my business cards.

It’s the epitome of how I write.

Your Turn

What will you print on your business cards to show that you’re unique?

I’d really like to know!

Until next time,

Most sincerely yours,

R.D. Burger

• X
• Facebook
• Reddit
• Tumblr