Category: How to Write a Novel

  • A truly solid writing day today…

    A truly solid writing day today…

    I am grateful for days like this one, when there’s a cool breeze blowing in the back window while I write, where I can heard birds singing and the leaves of maples and oaks rustling. Days like this feed the fiction, because the fictionalized town is a magical version of this town, and the sounds…

  • Today it was the Joy of Words

    Today it was the Joy of Words

    I love writing in my fantasy small-town Ohio world. Because while part of it is absolutely deep fantasy with really good magic, part of it is my house, and my street, and my little town right here… And I love my house, and my street, and my little town, and the folks who live here.…

  • The Mystery Deepens… Ohio 4 and Important People Lying

    The Mystery Deepens… Ohio 4 and Important People Lying

    Some days, writing is like flying — it’s effortless, and exciting, and maybe a bit scary and windy, especially when the ground seems a long, long way down. But these are the days when you have to pull yourself away from the words when all you want to do is keep going. I managed to…

  • So… TODAY was epic…

    So… TODAY was epic…

    Still working from my line-for-scene outline, today the scene i started yesterday just took off. I now have 9245 words done on the first draft. I got 1432 words today, AND discovered the thing I needed to see, and it was completely different than I’d been imagining… but I love it so much. Some days…

  • Good writing day. Not epic, but…

    Good writing day. Not epic, but…

    Not every day CAN be epic. I had to do something hard thinking, and some outlining, and some worldbuilding, and none of that stuff counts as words. But it’s all essential. However, the part I got, I love. So now I have to go out into the world and DO STUFF. •·.·´`·.·•·.·´`·.·•·.·´`·.·•·.·´`·.·• My daily words…

  • ‘Twas a fine day in writing land… with vengeance…

    ‘Twas a fine day in writing land… with vengeance…

    You know how you have heroes who you watch take a beating from the world, and get trampled by minions who’ve taken over something they’ve created? And you watch the over-throwing bastards who trample them ruin all the good stuff they made, and make a complete mess of this wonderful thing they put into the…

  • A very good Ohio Wednesday… and a disturbing twist

    A very good Ohio Wednesday… and a disturbing twist

    I got 1319 words today, nicely over my 1200-word objective. And I like what I got. Yesterday’s stuff was funny, but today’s words got serious as my main character and a friend of hers started investigating a project they want to take on — and my MC pointed out that there are some significant dangers…

  • The Other Shoe Dropped — Ohio 4 and the Friday “Say WHAT?!”

    The Other Shoe Dropped — Ohio 4 and the Friday “Say WHAT?!”

    In the first version of these novels, I had one main character who I was having do a lot of chasing around because my main character was being stubbornly stupid about an activity that was bad for her — except she refused to see it. I made her smarter. And because she stopped doing stubbornly…

  • And… YEP… Still outlining on Ohio Four

    And there’s really not a lot you can say about that. It’s one 30-word sentence per scene that has to encompass the essence of the chapter while moving the whole story forward, and it is a pretty fast, efficient way to give yourself a migraine. It works. It’s essential to my process of getting books…

  • Still outlining Ohio 4, but got sidetracked by writing the first chapter.

    Still outlining Ohio 4, but got sidetracked by writing the first chapter.

    It happens. You get about half of your 30-word chapter Sentences written, and this GREAT first sentence for a chapter pops into your head, so you go ahead and you write down that sentence because you know if you don’t you’ll forget it… And about 600 words later, you realize that you haven’t finished outlining…