Tag: novels

Going To Spend A Few Weeks On A Creative Reset Of The Four Novels I’m Developing & Writing


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Watching “Mare of Easttown” kind of rattled my creative cage a little bit and raised my personal expectations for myself. As such, I’m going to buckle down until the end of August and not only do some of the reading I should have done some time ago, I’m going to also really focus on the four outlines of the four novels I have planned.

But it’s the reading that I really need to focus on. Now that I realize it’s stuff like “Mare of Easttown” that I’m competing against I am determined to up my game. Another issue is I hope if I really, really establish the outlines before I start writing then they won’t keep collapsing on me and things will move a lot faster.

All of this is growing very embarrassing given how long I’ve been working on this project, but I don’t have anyone to tell me no and it’s my life, so, lulz.

Anyway, I hope to get a lot of reading done, a lot of work one the four outlines done and maybe even dabble in a little bit of short story writing. Ideally, I would also teach myself Final Draft, but that is probably going to get punted down the road some more.

Going To Focus On Development Of These Four Novels For A Few Days


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I have been using brute creative force on these four novels to a great deal of success the last few days. I may finally have an outline for the first novel that is stable enough that I can begin to focus on the next steps of the individual scene summaries and actually writing scenes as well.

It’s been a whole lot of work getting to this point. I must have worked a solid five or six hours today figuring out how to make the first novel’s outline sea worthy.

Having said all that, however, my personal life is going to get in the way for a few days as part of an extended weekend. As such, I’m probably just going to read and watch movies and TV shows to psych myself up for a huge push back into writing early next week.

In some respects, this is really annoying because I was hoping to start writing again on August 1st. But, lulz, that’s obviously not going to happen.

Come to think of it, in an effort to prevent my mind from overheating, I might spend this forced pause also trying to punch up the outline of the second book in the series. The third book’s outline — which was originally the first novel — is pretty much finished. The fourth book’s outline, however, is not.

I have made great process with these four books. And I really regret talking so much about this whole thing over the things. And, yet, I’m so extroverted, what else did you expect would happen?

But one thing that writing these four novels at the same time is really helping with is as my writing improves, I’m able to improve all the novels at the same time.

Anyway. I have a huge amount of development and writing to do.

The Benefits Of Writing A Four Novel Series At Once


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

By writing these four novels at once, I get to flesh out everything in a way that makes sense. In a way, I get to write one huge fucking novel that happens to be broken into four pieces.

With this first novel, I really like how I have strict conditions I have to work within. I know what is going to happen in the next three books and, as such, some things are out of my control. In a way, that makes writing the novel a lot easier.

I still have no idea what I’m doing, so I still feel as though I’m spinning my wheels at times. But these days, I’m using brute force to get myself where I want to be.

I really — really — want to have something finished in a big way by around the end of August. That is an arbitrary deadline that hopefully will force me to work a lot harder for a lot longer when I have the mood than maybe otherwise.

It’s a lot of work and a lot of fun. I am growing embarrassed by how much and how long I’ve written and talked about this project. I would just shut up, but I’m too much of an extrovert.

The Outline For The First Act Keeps Collapsing (But Getting Better)


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Well, after having looked at a few more episodes of Mare Of Easttown, I’m beginning to figure out how to fix my first act. That doesn’t, of course, prevent the outline I’m working on from collapsing again and again. But every time it collapses, it gets better.

I’m getting closer and closer to wrapping up the outline so I can get back to writing again. As I’ve mentioned before, I have a three step process to development — outline, scene summary and then writing. During the course of each of those steps, things have a tendency to collapse on me, sometimes in a rather spectacular fashion.

But I do have a huge amount of forward momentum, which helps.

And I’ve figured out that if I aggressively distract myself by watching something like Mare of Easttown or reading a book about writing — or, even better, another thriller — it figure out the solution to my problems.

It’s So Nice To Have No One To Tell Me ‘No’ When It Comes To Writing These 4 Novels


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I really have a very unique situation going on in my life. The key thing about it is –I have no one to tell me “no” when it comes to my creative life. If I want to go from one, to two to four novels, I can and I don’t have a wife or girlfriend to wince and say, “Honey, maybe you should get a short story published first?”

Fuck that.

As such, I’ve spend several years improving my writing and storytelling ability. The learning curve for writing a novel was far more severe than I could ever possibly imagined. But things have finally clicked for me.

I still have a shit tone of reading to do to flesh out my characters, but this first book in the series should go (hopefully) pretty quick now. I feel a lot of pressure because I have three more books to write as soon as possible.

This is a good thing, however, because snap, snap, I’m mortal and Stieg Larsson dropped dead within days of selling three — not four — novels. I feel like I’m tempting the writing fates at this point. Is the same thing going to happen to me if I get what I want (which is sell these four novels via the traditional publishing method.)

Anyway, I’m really enjoying myself. I do wish I could speed the process up some. To that, however, would require me not to be so hard on myself. But I have very, VERY high expectations for myself and, as such, the outline I keep working on collapses on almost a daily basis.

Wish me luck.

I’m Quite Pleased With The Universe I’ve Created For This Thriller Series


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Things are going really well with the four novel series I’m working on because all four books are compelling stories. But a lot — and I mean A LOT — could go wrong at any moment.

But you have to just put your head down and get to work at some point. You can freeze forever because of what MIGHT happen. Worry about what is actually know, what is not known.

I will admit that some of the aspects of this huge universe makes me nervous. And, yet, even the parts that make me nervous can be used in an interesting, compelling manner. I feel a little bit like what I imagine Freddy Mercury did when he was putting Bohemian Rhapsody together and everyone thought he was nuts.

I know in my mind what the vision is and how it will ultimately look like, but if you look at it right now as an outsider you might scratch your head and say, “But why start the series THEN?”

It makes sense in the context of the over all story. I feel compelled to tell the two stories set in the past because they’re compelling and they explain, with great detail, how this otherwise surreal little community came to be.

The biggest problem I have is forcing myself not to be so cruel to myself. I have a huge amount of self-imposed pressure on me right now — I need to knock out these four books ASAP, then turn around and do it all over again so I can let beta readers look at things.

This is a huge, huge project — which is exact what I wanted when I started all of this.

Of Prequels


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I mentioned to someone who has read the first part of the (now third) novel in the series about doing a two prequels. First, she had no idea what a “prequel” was in the first place. I think I was able to get across that I’m writing two new books that happen BEFORE what I’ve given her but are still in the same fictional universe.

But she was very pleased with what she read from me the last time I sent her something. This makes me very happy — it shows that I have, in fact, gotten better. A lot better. This makes me ecstatic.

Yet, as I struggled to explain to her, she knows me and, as such, even though she’s seen a lot of improvement, she still grades me on a curve. If someone like, say, a literary agent, were to read it cold, I’m still nowhere near my copy being good enough. I have, like, three more versions to finish before I get to that point.

What’s more, now I have *four* books to go through that entire process with.

But I’m really feeling the pressure to hurry up and do just that. The pressure to produce something, anything is getting pretty intense now. And I am writing a lot at the moment. I do like the how now I have an even bigger task ahead of me. I have a huge ego and I’m very ambitious — and motivated — so I it’s just a matter of focus at this point.

My Decision To Develop & Write Four Novels Instead of Two Is Working Out Well


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

They key reason why my decision to double the books in this initial group of novels has worked out so well is it allows me to do something different when the mood strikes and still stay in-universe.

I have all these great, great ideas rolling around in my mind these days and now I have an outlet to do something different while moving the overall project I’ve been working on for the last few years forward.

One thing that’s interesting is the prequels allow me to figure out how to tell a story that isn’t completely fueled by my white hot, center-of-the-sun rage against MAGA. These two prequel stories are a lot more character driven and very personal.

Anyway, I have a massive amount of work ahead of me. I feel a lot more need to just write something, anything sooner rather than later — when I finish the outlines to these four novels.

That should happen pretty soon, at least on a preliminary basis. I’m shooting for the end of July 4th weekend.

Novel Development Odds & Ends


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Some things I keep thinking about these days as I develop the first book in a four book (at least) series.

  1. Motivation & Writing Female Characters
    The better my storytelling ability gets, the more I find myself dwelling on motivation and how to construct interesting characters — usually female. I find developing female characters a lot more interesting than male characters because it’s so much more of a challenge to believably reverse engineer the personality and motivation of a female character (as male author.) And anyone who tells you to “just write a male character and flip the gender pronouns later” is full of shit. That’s a trite, pat, way of encouraging skittish male authors to write more female characters when, in fact, writing a female character as a male author is hard as shit.
  2. Gender & Hero Politics
    To write an effective Hero (Protagonist) for a story, they need to move the plot along. So, at the moment, I have my Heroine being rather passive at the climax of the story. I have come up with a way to make her far more active, but something occurred to me — there’s a reason why you see a lot of mom’s saving kids stories, but not a lot — if any of — of children saving mom stories. The implication is if a young man saves the metaphorical princess that they marry and live happily ever after. So, it’s weird to think that a son might save a mom from the dragon. But a mom saving a child (son) from danger fits the idea of a mother’s love.
  3. Writing An Interesting Female Character Is Tough
    I love to think up really interesting female protagonists, but given where all these stories are set, I really need to explain how is that all these out-there female characters could reside essentially in the same place when in real life you don’t often run into a woman as interesting as I’ve thought up. It’s not like there are all these Lisbeth Salanders running around Sweden. I have come up with a reason why these three women I need to exist would do so near each other, but I really need to think about the consequences of them being such iconoclasts. Men are socialized to be the Hero, while women — at least up until fairly recently — have been socialized to be the Princess who needs to be saved. For a real life woman to buck this very potent social construct would come with some significant downside for her on a personal level.

Waiting For The Muse


by Slhelt Garner
@sheltgarner

So, I’m now working on a four book series at the moment and there are gaps in the outline of the first book. I know how to fill these holes in the plot will come to me, but it’s going to be a little bit. I’m giving myself until the July 4th weekend to brood on this issue.

The more I think about it, the more the characters in this first book are improving. This first book — what was once a prequel — is going to be a tad shorter and more character based than maybe some of the other books may ultimately be. Things are still sorting themselves out on that front.

For the time being, I’m doing a lot of staring up at the ceiling struggling deep in thought about how to make at least three very unique — yet not identical — female characters who are extremely important to four books that span several decades. (Deep breath.)

All of this a huge amount of fun, but also a huge amount of work. I’m going to have to confront some fears. When I decided to reboot this project, I was just on the cusp of having the first book in a two book series figured out. Then, out of the blue, it occurred to me that I had the blueprint to two books set in the past relative to the story I was working on. And, well, now here we are.

Things are both moving fast and are kind of held up with this new first book. They’re going fast in that I know the overall plot of the story, but are held up because the more I think about the story, the more I realize I really need to dig deep for to figure out some of these characters that have been — to date — more just moods created as part of a huge backstory I had come up with for two books set in the modern era.

I have to admit that occasionally, I’m struck with a serious case of self-doubt. And, yet, the two additional novels I’ve come up with are compelling stories in their own right. So, I keep going.