Sitting down to write a book can be overwhelming. Even for me, after writing 57 novels and short stories, starting a new book is daunting. I feel like I’m back at the beginning all over again and don’t know what I’m doing or where to start.
Over the last six years that I’ve been writing, I’ve gone from complete discovery writer (or pantser—writing from the seat of your pants) where I have no plan and just a vague idea where the story is going, to a plotter, and then back to somewhere in between, and I’ve discovered that my process can change from one book to another depending on my state of mind when I sit down to write.
I have to admit, sitting down to write a detailed outline of my book does not fill me with joy. I have done it and then by the time I come to write the book, I’m bored with it. But sitting down to write a book with no plan at all (as I did for my first ten books or so) also does not fill me with joy. I love beginning new stories and the idea of discovery writing is exciting, but I know, after that initial beginning, I will lose my way.
After struggling to find my ideal process, I have decided that there is no ideal process. Each book I write needs different energy…or my state of mind at the beginning of each book needs a different jumping off point. But, being the person that I am, I do need some sort of process otherwise I fret over everything and I worry that the story I want to write won’t turn out to be the story that I do write.
I have read a lot of books on story structure and plotting and watched countless YouTube videos and read lots of blogs. There are as many ways to plot a book as there are writers who write them. What works for me is a combination of all of it, and even that changes from book to book.
As an experiment, I thought it would be fun to blog about the writing process I use for writing my next book. I have just finished the second book in The Kabiero Royals series and I’m in the beginning stages of writing the third book in the Hope Springs series. So why not open my office door and pull back the curtain and show you how I write.
Start at the Beginning
I don’t mean the beginning of the story.
One of the things I’ve realised is that my stories evolve. They don’t come into my head fully formed.
Some stories start with an opening scene. That’s what happened when I got the idea for Walk of Shame. I just had this idea for a scene where a woman wakes up in a strange hotel with no memory of the night before (not in a scary way).
Other times the characters appear in my head and demand I tell their story, as happened with Rock Star. Nate strolled up to me and started whining about how his career was going down the gurgler while Stevie’s was sky-rocketing.
And still other times, it’s a trope I want to explore or a theme I want to write about. No two stories come to me in the same way and not all story ideas make it into a book.
For my latest story, Unravel My Heart, I already had the characters. This will be the third book in the Hope Springs series, so I already have the world established and the characters, but I didn’t have a story.
And that is the crux. Ideas are a dime a dozen. But how do you turn an idea into a story?
Project Planner
I cannot hold an entire story in my brain…some people might be able to, but I can’t…and I’ve tried, believe me.
I also love to Bullet Journal, but I could never seem to shoe-horn my story planning into my journal. I like things to be in order, but I don’t always think in an orderly way and putting things into my Bullet Journal that were out of order just…let’s just say it made my brain sad.
My solution? A ring binder. I decided the best way to combine my project planning and my love of bullet journaling would be to create a separate bullet journal just for my project planning and to use a ring binder so I could create things out of order and then organise them. It was a revolutionary thought…for me, anyway.
How does it work?
One of the core take-aways I use from the Bullet Journals system is the idea of ‘spreads.’ (If you want to know more about Bullet Journaling read about it here.) I love Bullet Journal spreads. They can be for whatever you like, so in my project planner I can have spreads for characters and setting and scenes and conflicts and…you get the idea. And because they are in a ring binder, I can create a spread for whatever is in my head at any particular time and then just slot into the correct section of the binder without worrying that it is out of order (my brain is weird, I know).
Another thing I love about my Bullet Journal is the dot-grid page. But how could I use a dot grid in my binder? Can I buy dot grid pages? Can I create one myself? In doing a five-second Google search I discovered there is a web page that generates a dot grid page in any size you need that you can download and print.
*A tip for printing. Don’t use normal printer paper…well, you can, but I advise you to use a thicker quality paper. I like 160gsm paper because when I use my Tombow or Crayola Supertip markers, they don’t bleed through the page.
*A tip for using markers. Make sure you use water-based markers. Alcohol based markers will bleed through even 160gsm paper.
What are these spreads and how do I use them?
The beauty of using a project planner is that the spreads can be whatever you need them to be depending on the book you’re writing. Writing a book with a magic system? You can have a spread detailing how the magic works in your world. Have eight POV characters? You can create a spread for each one.
You can also use it to plan a series. Use it to outline your over-arching story arc, the story arc for each book, the characters, the world building etc.
As for what spreads I use, I’m going to detail them below. You can use them or not, this is just my system. The beauty of a project planner is that it is customisable to your needs.
Story Seeds
As I said earlier, stories evolve and for them to evolve, they need to start somewhere.
In the past, these story seeds have rattled around in my brain until I could put them into some sort of order, but this time around, I decided to try something different.
I have never been a big proponent of ‘brain dumping’ or ‘mind mapping’ mostly because I never really understood how to use them. So I did some research (thank you YouTube) and discovered something…I can actually use these two things and I might even quite like them after all.
Behold, the Story Seed Spread!
This is pretty much just a brain dump of all the ideas rattling around in my brain and cluttering it up.
A brain dump is different from brainstorming in that instead of trying to come up with ideas, you are just downloading all the ideas you already have.
The Story Seed Spread is literally a piece of paper for you to write down everything about your story idea. You don’t have to organise it in any particular way (that comes later) you just have to empty your brain onto the page. No pressure.
Mind Mapping
After you download all your ideas, now is the time to start organising them. This is where mind mapping comes in.
I started with some general categories and then using my Story Seeds spread, I start to sort my ideas into the appropriate categories. This sparks some more ideas too and if I can’t find a place for them on the Mind Map spread, they can go on the Story Seeds spread and I can come back to them later.
Start with the name of the book in the centre and then surround it with the categories you want to explore. For me, I use these categories: Characters, Location/Setting, Tropes, Themes, Main Conflict, Metamorphosis, Misbeliefs.
*I will go into a more detailed explanation of these categories in the next blog post.
Drilling Down
After the initial Mind Mapping, it’s time to start developing or drilling down into the ideas and expanding on them.
I started with another Mind Map, this one only focused on one of the main characters. I start with the character’s name in the centre and then break out the different categories; Family, Career, Fears, Goals, Back Story, Physical Description, and Misbeliefs.
Next I did a Mind Map for the Location of the story and used the following categories: Stores/Shops, Places of Interest, Weather/Climate/Season, Geography, Identity, Landmarks, Offices.
Profile Pages
From these Mind Maps I can then create profile cards for the individual characters and the location. This forms the base of what is commonly called a ‘Story Bible’ or ‘Series Bible.’ These are the things you want to keep on hand so you can see at a glance what Cassidy’s eye colour is or how tall Brad is (you get the idea).
I keep a copy of these profiles in the binder of my Scrivener file so I can just click over to them when I’m writing to check details (if you’ve never used Scrivener or don’t know what it is, it is a writing software specifically designed for authors and it is amazing. Click this link to check it out)
Putting it Together
All of this groundwork forms the foundation of the story I’m growing. You can do all this is a couple of hours and although it may seem a little repetitive, I find that with each iteration, I discover more about my characters and my story.
But in saying that, this doesn’t have to be completed to start writing. Oftentimes, I will start writing without a plan, just some story seeds and a vague idea. The beauty of this is that you can do it at any point in your process. You can start writing and write until you hit a roadblock. Then you can come back and develop the idea further before heading off into writing again. Or you might just want to start by brain dumping all your ideas and then start writing before coming back to refine the story more.
This is also not the end of my planning process. These are just the initial stages, but more on that next time.
Helpful Links:
(some of these may contain affiliate links)
Books I’ve Read on Writing Craft
Writing with Jenna Moreci (YouTube Channel)
Brandon Sanderson (YouTube Channel)