How to Write a Damn Good Novel – Books > Fiction

After months of plotting and arranging scenes and rearranging scenes and pulling my hair because I’m not sure about the motivation and the stakes aren’t high enough and why doesn’t anybody care about the conflict anyway?, I’ve gotten a step sheet worked out with enough cause and effect that I can start writing.

I’ve gotten two scenes done, and though they’re incomplete and not as sparkly as I’d like them to be, I’m pleased with their quality for a first draft.

I didn’t write the stepsheet all the way to the end, because I have that part of the story in my head pretty well, and I don’t want to spoil the freshness of it by over-planning.

It’s an interesting phenomenon in my writing experience–I slog and slog and slog, and it seems like it’s going to take forever, and then suddenly it’s done. The mapping has been like that.

There will be refinements to the map, I’m sure, but I’ve got the directions laid out so that I don’t get lost in the swamp.