Steven Smith - author
  • Home
  • About
  • Books
    • THE WASTE
    • THIS SACRED ISLE
    • THE MAP OF THE KNOWN WORLD
    • THE ORDEAL OF FIRE
    • THE LAST DAYS
  • Blog
  • Contact
  • Home
  • About
  • Books
    • THE WASTE
    • THIS SACRED ISLE
    • THE MAP OF THE KNOWN WORLD
    • THE ORDEAL OF FIRE
    • THE LAST DAYS
  • Blog
  • Contact

A Suffolk Writer's blog

Writing 'This Sacred Isle' - Planning

11/10/2016

0 Comments

 
Continuing my blog series detailing the writing of This Sacred Isle, I'll look during this post at planning for the novel.
Picture
The picture above shows my ‘story planner’, which follows a template based upon the Monomyth, the Hero’s Journey, story structure. It is fair to say that the Hero’s Journey structure is not without its critics and often there is validity to their arguments (too general, too male-focused); but I look upon this as a building block, a first step in the construction of my narrative. My ‘story planner’ allows me to have a quick, high-level first pass at compiling the structure and rhythm of the story.

How does it work? Well, it is a very cheap, lo-fi tool! I print out the sections onto an A3 sheet and then simple add post-it notes (different colours for narrative points, characters, mood etc.) to the relevant sections to map out the plot. In time, you should end up with something like this (though maybe tidier).

If you use this method, my advice is not to rush through it. Spend a few weeks building the structure and take time looking it, moving elements around. I think you’ll be surprised how quickly a narrative outline starts to form. I find it invaluable in the process of moving from a mass of ideas to an actual story.

Now armed with a post-it festooned / smothered story planner for This Sacred Isle, I was now ready to move to the next stage, to more detailed planning for the novel. For this next stage, I used what I call my ‘treatment’ – a term borrowed, rather grandly, from Hollywood, where it describes a prose outline that is between the initial scene cards and the screenplay. Indeed, you could look at the story planner as the ‘scene cards’ and the first draft of your novel as the ‘screenplay’ to understand how the treatment fits into the process.

My treatment for ‘This Sacred Isle’ ran to approximately 11,000 words. To summarise, this is what I included:

  • Chapter by chapter breakdown – description of plot points, characters, mood, theme. The story planner was obviously crucial in this process
  • Within chapters, some specific passages of dialogue to be developed in the first draft
  • List of character names (or at least suggestions for character names)
  • List of key inspirations (artwork etc.) and research points to consider
  • List of Anglo-Saxon kennings and other terms

What are the advantages of compiling a treatment rather than simply steaming into the first draft? Well, I feel a treatment allows me to build a comprehensive plan of the novel, chocked full of detail – it is invaluable when writing the first draft (and beyond) as I have a document to refer back to. This is both a reassurance during the arduous process of writing a first draft, and a way of ensuring that early ideas are not missed.

There is the danger that ideas noted in the treatment become ‘cast in stone’, and that early plans and thoughts are not challenged later. But this should not be an issue if you use the treatment as it should be: as a support tool and a method of beginning to drill down into the detail of your emerging novel.


How do you plan your stories? Please share any thoughts or suggestions below.


0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Archives

    October 2023
    August 2023
    July 2023
    October 2022
    August 2022
    May 2021
    September 2020
    August 2020
    October 2019
    September 2019
    June 2019
    February 2019
    December 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    May 2018
    December 2017
    October 2017
    August 2017
    June 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016

    Categories

    All
    2000AD
    Alfred Wallis
    Anglo Saxon
    Art
    Book Review
    Comics
    Cornwall
    Descriptive Writing
    Dialogue
    Doctor Who
    Dystopia
    Editing
    Elisabeth Frink
    Fantasy
    Fantasy Art
    Folk Art
    Ghosts
    Gormenghast
    History
    Hobbit
    Horror
    Ian Miller
    John Christopher
    Landscape
    Lord Of The Rings
    Magic
    Middle Earth
    Middle-earth
    Monsters
    Naive Art
    Osten Ard
    Peter Jackson
    Planning Novels
    Post Apocalyptic
    Post-apocalyptic
    Publication
    Research
    Science Fiction
    Sculpture
    Star Trek
    Stephen King
    St Ives
    Television
    This Sacred Isle
    Tolkien
    Writing

    RSS Feed

KEEP IN TOUCH WITH ME ON SOCIAL MEDIA

Photos from TKCA photography, WordRidden, Alyssa L. Miller, jason ilagan, SisterPrice, markus spiske, Andreas*D, Ian's Shutter Habit, Andrew Stawarz, Matt From London, Kumpei Shiraishi, Marcin Wichary, chaz jackson, jvoves, Dean Hochman, Jiv.Talking, Tim Green aka atoach, perzonseo, Danny Tax Creative, icathing, librariestaskforce, xiquinhosilva, wwarby, lukas schlagenhauf, Rosmarie Voegtli, Michael Casey, penjelly, Insights Unspoken, jodastephen, publicdomainphotography, torbakhopper, Nouhailler, J McSporran, Sam-H-A, BBM Explorer, KathrynW1, Marianne Bevis, Christoph Scholz