Starting today, I am working on a new book idea from scratch. After several trunked novels (and many lessons learned along the way about what went wrong with my stories), I am committed to finishing this one.
This is going to be a chronicle of my writing process from today, as I start the novel, all the way through publication and possibly beyond.
So, today, I started with getting the premise of my novel straight. One of the things I’ve learned through past projects is that it is critical to have a clear premise line in place before hand and to hold myself to it! Last time I went off the rails and the story lost its way.
So, today, I wrote my premise line as well as my logline for the book and a draft of the book jacket copy. By doing this, I have defined what the story is about – who it happens to and what kind of emotional journey the reader can expect from it.
I also followed John Truby’s advice from Anatomy of Story to evaluate the premise, thinking about what promises it makes and expectations it creates, what challenges will be in the story, the designing principle, the central conflict and the hero’s basic action for the cause and effect pathway. I still have a little more work to do about thinking about the hero’s story change/character change tomorrow, as well as her final moral decision.
From now on, I plan to review the premise and copy every day as I start writing to help keep me on track.