Avoid the chilli soup!

Hello! Long time no see and so forth. Struck me the other day that's it's been quite some time since I forsook writing to actually blog and today I want to talk about novel writing.

Yes, when writing scripts starts to go nowhere and you suddenly think, you know what, I may give novel writing a try as I'm a masochist. (Much like when I get hungry, think I've grabbed the broth and end up with the other half's chilli soap. It was windy in the City. I'll say no more.)

If you thought writing scripts was a doozy this one is 70-90,000 words of one and that's for a thriller. So, how do you a tackle a blank page and turn it into something that resembles a book?

Well, first of all, read some books! You can't get an idea of what you want to do until you've had a good look at what is out there in your style and genre. How do you know where your book will fit on the shelf and what the competition is like if you don't know that. So, that's Step 1.

For Step 2: Like with scriptwriting you need to form an idea and a character. Mull it over, who it is, why they are there and what you think you can achieve with them, what do you want to say and why?

For me, I came up with an idea that's in between a psychological thriller and a police procedural, one feisty character later and I sat down to write, three months later and I had about 60,000 words and a two hundred and twenty odd page draft and there's where the work began, I have groomed that thing to within an inch of it's life combing and tweaking it like a show dog. So, it's now close to the 70,000 and worked and worked like Nonna's pasta.

Needless to say, the actual writing is not the hard bit, for me, anyway. I find the ideas pour onto the paper and I'm a pantser who tends to plan in my head but once I have my draft, that's when the planning and twisting comes in as I see what I can do to make life even more challenging and horrendous for my character than it already is.

For example; Writer takes the wrong soup, sits to write, has a leak (not personally), reacts to the soup, ends in loo, joiner knocks, writer leaves loo worried with her zip undone, falls over, embarrassing moment as joiner hears thud and writer opens the door scarlet from tumbling on the stairs with her zip done, joiner notices, winks. Writer flushes to her socks, joiner commences work and climbs on the roof, writer - relieved- returns to write - gurgle - returns to loo, joiner falls through loo roof as writer - trousers round ankles, hair askew - reacts to surprise reaction from chilli soup and chaos ensues Phew!

Now if I wanted to up the tension, I could have 'Writer eats poisoned soup, sits to write, vomits, staggers stairs to the bathroom, pallid, retching. A knock. Can she get downstairs to answer? Losing feeling she drags herself to the door, tumbles down the stairs, thud. It's locked, trapped she tries to reach to answer but the keys out of reach. She yells to the joiner for help through the letter box. Ladders unfurl to the roof where he gets to work on the cage. Her husband, the joiner, opens the door to his paralysed wife and says 'Next time, enjoy my soup'.

I'm sure some of you could make it tighter but you get the gist.

Then Step 3 is like Crufts. You put it out for show locally as you let beta-readers see it. If they 'Oooh' and 'Aaah' over its lovely form, you then send it out to agents and hope one says that your's is Best in Show and not 'That one's okay but take it home, remove the soup residue and come back after a good de-lousing.'

You also have to add, your title page, preferably with just your telephone and e-mail on it and chapters but those all go into the mix as if you were making soup.

By the way, no joiner was harmed in the making of this blog.

Keep writing and word to the wise, avoid the chilli soup... even if it's novel!