The Big Question, Part 16

START YOUR READING LIST

If you haven't already, you need to start listing the books you read.  

Make a note of all the publishing information as well as a brief plot summary, the type of book it is, and your impressions of the book, then put it in a file for later when you begin to plan the marketing of your book.

Also mention where the book is physically. This will save you from ripping your keeper shelves apart when the book came from the library or was loaned to you.

You may be eclectic in your reading, but the NY publishers aren't eclectic in their buying. Every line, whether romance or otherwise, has neat little pigeon holes for each kind of book, and if you choose the wrong pigeon hole to put your book in, they'll toss it back to you.

Being published for the first time is hard enough when you have an incredible book that's perfectly crafted. Don't shoot yourself in the foot and waste your time and some editor's by sending a book written for one market to another.

Also, notice what the first-time writers have sold to publishers. Nora Roberts can do incredibly innovative things because she has the name and audience to do it so editors let her write whatever she pleases.  

The first-time writer shows you what you probably can get away with and sell. Of course, if that new writer's book failed badly, I wouldn't use it as your poster child to a successful career.

If you are going to self-publish, all this information will be useful in not only figuring out where to put the book but how to market it.  

The Big Question, Part 15

 WRITING THE BOOK

Once you have your three levels-- the Big Question, the characters, and the general plot, and you have your world building complete, you are ready to begin writing the book.  

As you write, remember that the Big Question drives your book, but it should be invisible to the reader.  Avoid sermonizing at all costs.

And if you lose the thread of your novel or hit the dreaded writer's block, go back over your original notes and examine what you've been writing recently.  More than likely, you've strayed away from the Big Question.  

Go back a bit and get that book on track so you'll have a book that will resonate with readers.

WHAT GOES INTO A NOVEL?

 If you're still not sure about how to construct a novel, you need to take a novel or two apart.

You do this by going to your keeper shelf and finding several books of the type you want to write.   These books should be fairly recent, no more than a year or so old.   Try to find one by a familiar name writer.   Another should be by a fairly new writer with a few books out in that genre.

Here's how you take each novel apart.   Start reading the book with a pen and pencil beside you.   After each chapter, write down the major plot points and events that happened in that chapter.   When you're done, you'll have a good overview of how much goes into that size novel.   Do this for several novels.   If you know of a book that is close to how you imagine your book with the plot, be sure to take that book apart chapter by chapter as well.

Some writing instructors go so far as to say you should analyze the amount of dialogue, narrative, character interiors, etc. To do this, take a number of different colors of highlighters and code each color for a specific aspect of the novel (dialog, interiors, love scenes, etc.) then highlight away.    You need only do this for a few chapters, and you can make copies of the pages if you don't want to mess up the book.  You can also usually find the first chapter or two on the author's website or Amazon.

This type of analysis is especially useful for series romances from Harlequin.

I did the chapter analysis of a Dick Francis suspense novel before I started my first suspense, and it was an eye-opening experience about how much goes into a novel.

I know a few writers who have actually used the chapter by chapter analysis of another book to write their own.   The result wasn't suitable for selling but few first novels are, and the writer learned a lot about constructing a plot.

Worksheet 7

 WORKSHEET 7

If you want to sell what you write, particularly to a major publisher where the money is, this is a very important worksheet to do.  You have to read what you want to write, and you have to read widely.  

List recent published books (the last year) that you have read that are similar to the book you want to write.  Who is the publisher?  How long is the book?

By similar, I mean it may have the type of general plot you are using.  

For example, your book is a romantic suspense involving the hero and heroine being chased by organized crime, and the romantic relationship is as important as the suspense plot.  A general plot would be a book with a chase at the center of the story.  

The Big Question, Part 14

 THE GAME WE PLAY AS A BIG QUESTION

I've put together my Big Question notes on my out-of-print romantic suspense novel, THE GAME WE PLAY, to show you how I went from a few ideas to a complete novel.  

What genre (science fiction, for example) or book line (Harlequin Intrigue, for example) are you aiming toward? If it is single title (not part of a line), what length?

Single Title Romantic Suspense, 75,000 words

 

What is your big question?

After total betrayal, can a person regain their trust?  

What are its two sides?

Trust versus distrust

List the characters you will need to answer your big question and show each character's function as part of the big question.  Only give general answers.  The specifics will be the next exercise. 

After being betrayed, NICK PRICE trusts no one.  He's put into a situation where he is forced to trust Faith and betray his best friend, Clement.

After being betrayed, FAITH CODY has regained her trust in others.  She's forced to trust Nick who doesn't deserve it and betray Clement who does.

Clement has lived a life of false identity and betrayal because he was The Night, a legendary cat burglar who robbed the wealthy on the Continent before WW II.  During the war, he fought with the Resistance against the Nazis.  He returned to the US with a pardon and began a new, fairly honest life, but he still has a ruthless streak. In contrast to his past life, he is kinder and more honest with Faith than Nick is.  He is Nick's foil emotionally and romantically.

Joseph, Clement's right hand man and unofficially adopted son, is the distrustful one who sees Nick as a rival and a danger to Clement. He is Clement's foil as well as the inciting presence in the mansion.

 

Flesh the major characters out and give background and motivation:

FAITH CODY's life has been shaped by betrayal and desertion.  When she married Sam Cody over her father's objections, her family disowned her.   His own life in crisis, her beloved, weak-willed Sam turned to alcohol and other women.  Faith remained loyal until, in an alcoholic fury, he beat and raped her.  She left him, and he died soon after.  

Totally alone, Faith became strong and courageous in the face of adversity.  She reshaped her life, worked to free herself of the past, and learned how to protect herself so no one could ever physically hurt her like that again.  

Avoiding another relationship with a man, she focused her attention on repaying Sam's debts and lavished her great love and loyalty on the children she teaches.  

By the time THE GAME WE PLAY begins, she's almost healed from the betrayals of the past, and like a butterfly she's ready to emerge from her cocoon, her heart able to love again.

NICHOLAS PRICE has also been shaped by betrayal and desertion, but his reaction has been very different from Faith's.  A respected investigative reporter for a prestigious Washington newspaper, he was tossed into a sanitarium for erratic, violent behavior.  By the time he emerged eight months later, his wife had married the lawyer who'd put him into the sanitarium, he'd lost custody of his two children to that man, and his job was gone.  

Only Nick and a few close friends know Nick's erratic behavior had been deliberately caused by chocolates spiked by hallucinogens.  Nick is certain his good friend and lawyer Adam did it to steal his wife, children, and his life.

Formerly a warm, loving, and deeply empathetic man, Nick has emerged from this experience a cynic no longer certain of anyone.  He expects the worst of others to save himself the hurt of disillusionment, and he avoids emotional relationships.

List your story arcs.  Include the main story arc, any secondary story arc, and subplots that are needed.  

Main story arc:

Nick and Faith must find Clement's documents to ransom Nick's children.

Romantic story arc:

Faith must teach Nick to love and trust again, and help him survive the brutal emotional pressure caused by his children's kidnapping.

Subplots: 

Faith becomes friends with Clement who sees her more truly than Nick, and she starts to unravel the secrets of Clement's nature to discover where he would hide the documents as well as discover his one great secret which will change everything.  Her relationship with him is flirty, but he knows she loves Nick while she recognizes that Clement is the kind of man she should love instead of dark and damaged Nick.

The kidnappers use sick messages, cause accidents, and attack Faith to hurt Nick and destroy him emotionally.

THE GAME WE PLAY PLOT SUMMARY

Taking all this information, I wrote my plot synopsis.  I've colored coded the back story in red, and the trust/distrust Big Question in blue.

THE GAME WE PLAY  COMPLETE SYNOPSIS

Plot back story                  Trust and distrust

From a drugged sleep, schoolteacher FAITH CODY wakes in an unfamiliar bed with a strange man leaning over her.  Assuming rape, she groggily attacks him, but she finally recognizes NICHOLAS PRICE by his resemblance to his son.  She tells him and his ex-father-in-law, Austin, that she was sent by Nick's ex-wife April as governess for Nick's two children for their summer visit with their grandfather.  She remembers getting on the airplane with the children, but nothing else, including being dumped by the kidnappers on Austin's front lawn.

Nick's upset when he learns April's pregnant by her new husband because a third pregnancy could be fatal especially if she becomes distraught about the children's kidnapping.  He's also bitter April doesn't trust him alone with his children.

A ransom note arrives, but rather than money, the children's kidnappers demand that Nicholas steal some special documents from Clement Zachary, Nick's best friend and one of the most dangerous criminals of the century.  The documents are incriminating evidence against Clement's criminal enemies that Clement uses as blackmail so they can't kill him.

Faith decides to go with Nick to help save the children.

Later, Faith overhears Nick and Austin.  Nick believes her a spy either for April or the kidnappers, but he intends to take her with him to Las Vegas to steal the documents so he can keep an eye on her.  He's also suspicious because under her "disguise" of glasses, ugly hairdo, and cheap clothes she has the looks of a centerfold model, but he's eager to play house with her.  Nick discovers her eavesdropping, and she asserts her only loyalty is to the children whom she loves.  Enjoying her spirit and their sexual attraction, he bickers playfully with her.

The next day, Nick transforms her into the "centerfold model" with a trip to the beauty shop, and he buys her an expensive and far too provocative wardrobe.  Shocked at seeing herself as she was four years before when her husband died, she realizes how much she's let herself go from fear of being hurt again.  

At the airport, Nick chastises her for pulling away from him in public since she's pretending to be his mistress.  She demonstrates her acting ability by passionately kissing him.  The acting proves to be in pretending the seismic kiss hasn't rocked her off her feet.

Faith realizes she must keep Nick emotionally stable with their playful bickering and sexual attraction as his emotional outlet.  April had warned her of Nick's mental breakdown -- two years before this, he tried to strangle an editor at the prestigious Washington paper where he worked as an investigative journalist.  Because of erratic, violent behavior and hallucinations, he spent 8 months in a mental institution, but Austin had him released despite his psychiatrist's objections.  Nick hasn't had severe symptoms since although stress could make him fall apart again.  Despite her awareness this dark, violent side could reappear again, Faith is attracted by Nick's charm and his intense love for his children.

At Clement's isolated estate where they're staying, Faith meets Joseph Sabat, Clement's right hand man whom Clement raised and educated, and Clement-- a dashing gentleman and rogue.  Clement is charmed by Faith, who must entertain him to keep his attention away from Nick's search for Clement's infamous hidden safe.

That night, Nick becomes violently agitated when Joseph offers him his favorite chocolates, but Faith covers for Nick and gets him up to their suite.  Later, Nick visits her bedroom, and they talk.  He explains that Clement is The Night, the famous cat burglar who preyed on the wealthy on the Continent before the second war, and who was a thief and assassin for the Allies during the war, but who has retired to being law-abiding.  They met when Clement saved young reporter Nick from vengeful criminals more dangerous than Nick was experienced.  Clement took him under his wing and educated him in the ways of the real world and on the skills of the professional criminal.  Nick now employs these skills to investigate criminals.

Nick, using his cat burglar skills, breaks into Clement's third floor private quarters, but returning, he falls from a breaking limb, setting off the alarm, and hits Faith's balcony.  She drags him stunned into her bedroom and undresses him then gets into bed with him to provide him with an alibi.  Joseph enters with a gun but isn't suspicious when he finds them entwined together kissing.  He sees the broken limb and departs.  Sensing her response to him, Nick wants to stay the night, but she refuses telling him she needs more than sex with a man.  She needs love, trust, and security.

The next morning, Faith examines the broken limb which could have been partially cut.  She flirts with Clement by the pool while Nick's swimming, but Clement quickly recognizes her as the small town, old-fashioned schoolteacher she is.  

She admits to the deception and honestly says that Nick insisted she play at this sophisticated role, not to fool Clement, but to allow Nick to keep their relationship casual.  Clement tells her she reminds him of his late wife, and he sees her emotional as well as physical attraction to Nick.  Jealous Nick shows off on the diving board but falls and is nearly hurt when the diving board comes loose.

Once again, Faith discovers that Nick's fall could have been engineered.  She also senses she and Nick are being watched by Joseph whose bland appearance hides an extremely dangerous personality.  Nick tells her that Joseph is obsessively protective of Clement whom he considers his father.  Joseph has become suspicious of them.

Nick receives a photograph of the children with a sadistic threat to them on the back which devastates him.  

That evening, Nick becomes furious when Faith suggests they seek April's husband Adam's help.  He pounces on her then releases her to show her how anyone, even someone she trusts, can betray without warning.  He tells her that Adam, his friend and lawyer, had deliberately put him into a fashionable sanitarium which wouldn't bother to cure him, then Adam wooed and stole Nick's emotionally fragile wife then adopted his children.  Because of this betrayal, Nick has lost his ability to trust anyone as well as to understand others' personalities.

To keep Clement out of Nick's burgling way, Faith spends the next afternoon with Clement in his quarters where they talk.  Clement reminisces about his late wife and speaks of his passion for the poetry of Edgar Allen Poe.  Faith realizes she likes and trusts Clement whose death she must cause, and both tacitly acknowledge sexual attraction.  She begins her own campaign to find the documents by learning how Clement thinks and feels.

Nick can't find Clement's hidden safe.

That evening after they return to their suite, jealous Nick becomes angry at her for sleeping with Clement when she won't let him touch her.  She explodes herself, grabs him by the lapels, and gives him some home truths-- that he insisted she entertain Clement, that it's none of his business whether she did or didn't sleep with Clement, and that she hasn't slept with Clement because he thinks Nick intends to marry her and honorable Clement wouldn't put a finger on the future mother of more godchildren.  Nick is shocked out of his jealous anger and into amused laughter.

The next day, a chastened Nick takes Faith to Vegas for some investigating.  They lunch, and Faith gets to know the tender, charming, and silly Nick April must have known.  Faith tells of her unhappy marriage with an alcoholic husband who beat and raped her before she left him.  

They seek information on Clement's enemies to determine which one has kidnapped the children, and they narrow down the field to certain underworld types after Clement's casinos.  Faith's natural trust and understanding of people proves a valuable asset to distrustful Nick. 

Two hoods grab them and shove them into an alley, but before one of the hoods can harm Faith, she and Nick defeat them.  She allows Nick to comfort her.

A cat burglar reluctant to give them information flees them, but Faith helps catch him on the catwalks above a nightclub stage, and she convinces him to trust them by trusting him.  Nick gains a valuable clue to the location of Clement's illusive safe, and they return to the estate.

A sick note and small package from the kidnappers arrives, but rather than the ear or toe the note implies, Nick finds a lock of his little girl's hair.  He goes into an emotional tailspin.

Faith realizes she's falling in love with Nick, and concerned for his emotional stability, she wonders if the children's kidnapping, his almost fatal accidents, the sadistic notes, and the men in the alley might be a plot to drive Nick back into a mental institution.  

That night, Nick finds the safe and breaks into it, but the documents are not within.  Riven by his despair that the last hope for his children is gone, Faith becomes his lover.  Lust turns to tenderness when he realizes she hasn't been with a man since her husband raped her and she's frightened.  He opens himself up emotionally, revealing stronger feelings for her than he'll admit to, but the next morning after she tells him she loves him, he retreats into his untrusting emotional shell again although he depends more and more on her emotional strength and love to help him survive the pressure.

Having no other clue, Nick starts looking for a new safe.  That night because of her sexual relationship with him, she remembers clearly a hazy recurring nightmare she's had since the kidnapping.  The dream proves to be a memory of the kidnappers blurred by drugs and her fear of recalling it.  Nick recognizes her description of one of the kidnappers as a local ambitious hood.  She has a hazy recollection of Joseph, but Nick doesn't believe she's right.  They also figure out a professional cat burglar like Clement would have no trust in safes, and recalling Poe's "Purloined Letter," she decides the documents are in plain sight.

Clement tells her the truth about Nick's mental breakdown -- Nick had been cleverly fed hallucinogens to cause his symptoms, but Clement had spotted the deception when he visited the institution and discovered Nick's favorite chocolates with Clement's real name on them as sender.  Clement and Austin rescued Nick from the hospital, and when the drugs were out of his system, Nick returned to normal.  Nick is certain Adam did it to steal April.

After Faith lures Clement away from his quarters, Nick finds the documents.  He and Faith meet the kidnappers in an empty warehouse in Vegas.  Nick prevents the villains from killing them and the children with his own secreted copies of the incriminating documents, and he and Faith take the drugged but healthy children to the hospital.

Faith leaves their hospital room where they're curled against their father asleep, and she wanders about thinking.  She bumps into Clement, and in a panic, she begs him not to kill Nick for stealing the documents.  Clement assures her he has no intention of killing Nick, and asks after the children.  

He then tells her a secret no one else knows, but she's begun to guess-- he's Nick's natural father.  He'd been in prison when Nick's mother died giving birth to Nick, and Nick had been adopted by his mother's sister who told him his father had died a Korean War hero.  Clement never has nor ever will tell Nick the truth about himself, but he's always watched over Nick.

Completely reassured about Nick's safety, Faith confides that Nick doesn't love her or need her anymore now that the children are safe so she's going home.  Nick joins them.

Clement tells Nick he got the message Nick left behind about stealing the documents, and he went after the kidnappers at the rendezvous and found them dead, his documents retrieved by Joseph who'd followed Nick and Faith from the estate.

Joseph arrives and pulls a gun because Nick now knows he arranged the children's kidnapping to discredit Nick with Clement.  Joseph's always been insanely jealous of Nick and Clement's close relationship, and even though raised by Clement, Joseph senses Nick means more to Clement than he does.  He also has learned Nick is Clement's primary heir.  Joseph sneeringly admits to sending the poisoned chocolates that put Nick into the mental institution and trying to destroy Nick with the children's kidnapping, the near fatal accidents, Faith's assault in the alley, and the sadistic notes.

Clement pleads with him not to kill Nick and admits that Nick is his natural son.  These shocking words draw Clement's and Nick's eyes from the gunman and toward each other.  Joseph whispers, "I should have been your son," and shoots at Nick.  Faith steps in front of Nick and takes the bullet.

Clement and a hospital guard disarm Joseph, but Nick catches Faith and holds her.  Clement returns and discovers she isn't seriously wounded. 

Nick demands to know why she risked her life for him.  Irritated, she grabs his lapel, shakes him, and gives him another home truth -- she loves him, and now he'd better give up his distrust and believe her.  After she's repaired, Nick admits he loves her too and proposes, but she refuses him.

Over a week later, Nick, Faith, Clement, and the children have returned to Austin's beach home.  Watching the children play on the beach with their secret grandfather, Faith and Nick talk.  Nick tells her he's come to terms with Adam stealing April from him and he's buried old grudges and wants to live in the same town so he can see his children more often.  He realizes he's not the same man he was.  He would never be happy again with a fragile, dependent woman like April; he wants a strong, courageous woman like Faith.  He also talks about his future plans.  

He admits Faith was right not to marry him in the heat of the moment, and that he's enjoyed courting her and getting to know her in peaceful circumstances.  He assures her he's still certain his feelings toward her aren't motivated by guilt or gratitude.  He proposes again, and sensing Nick does love her and has learned to trust again, she agrees.

NOTE:  I will be posting Worksheet 7, tomorrow.  

Worksheet 6

 WORKSHEET 6

If your novel requires a back plot, please give a brief summary.

EXAMPLE:  In STAR-CROSSED, the plague which totally changed Arden's society mutated into a harmless form twenty years after the first outbreak.  By this time, the women in power didn't want to let go of that power or emancipate the men so they didn't tell the population about this.  

To keep up the harem population, the leaders told mothers of newborn boys that their child had died of the plague then put the child into the harem system.  

Mara's mother, Jorel, was the premiere scientist on Arden, and when it was time for her to choose her mate for a year from the lottery, she met Adam Randell, an Earth astrophysicist whose spaceship had been damaged by the nearby asteroid belt.  They fell in love, but she was unable to free him although he was a scientist.  When she became pregnant with Mara, he killed himself before he could be returned to the lottery.

Embittered, Jorel began to hack into the government computers, etc., to find a way to destroy the harem system.  She discovered the horrific truth but didn't dare risk destroying the system because she feared for Mara's safety.

Before she died, she gave all this information to Novia to give to Mara if she was ever faced with losing her own mate or risked losing a boy to the lottery.

By the time Cadaran came into power, the use of men as bribes and the money from their sale was rampant.  Cadaran made the system even more brutal to build her power structure, and she also started slaving operations in the nearby star lanes to acquire off-world “exotic” men.  

Tristan and Kellen were victims of these slavers.

Novia fears for Mara's safety, and she distrusts Tristan so she refuses to share this information when Tristan comes into their lives.

The Big Question, Part 13

 BACK PLOT 

The back plot is what happens before the novel begins.  

No, I'm not talking about a character's back story which is what happened to the character in his life-- he was born, etc.  Instead, I'm talking about the plot line or events, usually the villain's, which must be discovered by the characters in the novel.

Back plot usually isn't necessary for a standard romance, but it is essential in romantic suspense, mystery, most cross-genre novels, and complex novels such as many paranormals and historical romances.

Remember that the back plot must be as logical as the novel's plot with attention paid to motivation, etc.  If the back plot makes no sense or is filled with coincidences, illogical information, etc., the whole novel will be deeply flawed.

THE BACK PLOT THICKENS

  

Tell me the plot of "The Hound of the Baskervilles."

Easy enough you say. A country doctor comes to Sherlock Holmes and Watson. The local lord has died of heart failure, but there were a giant hound's tracks near his body, and there's this family legend about....

But is that the only plot?

Not really. Long before old Sir Charles is frightened to death by a hound, there is a man in South America, a distant relative of Sir Charles, who decides he will be the new lord of Baskerville Hall so he changes his name, makes his wife pretend to be his sister, and....

Some mystery writers call this second storyline the back plot. It is the story behind the story. The detective's plot is the discovery of the back plot. Holmes must reconstruct the murderer's back plot through the clues left behind. He must understand what happened before.

This twining together of two plots is the glory of the mystery and the agony of the mystery writer for she must not only have one plot which is logical and interesting. She must also create a second which intersects it backwards in time.

No, that's not crazy. Think about it. A murder occurs, and the detective investigates. He finds clues, and these clues point toward the past of the victim and the murderer. The detective must decipher these clues to discover the who, what, when, where, and why of the murder. He must travel back in time to the murderer and his motives.

Holmes studies the crime scene, the stories of the butterfly collector, the sounds of the moor, and the ancestor's portrait, as well as other clues to find that distant Baskerville relative who has designs on the family fortune.

How does a writer create these two plot lines? The answer to that is as diverse as the authors questioned. Some create the back story, pick the relevant clues to pepper the novel with then set their detective to work.

Other writers are as surprised as their detective at the murder scene and never guess the killer until the last chapter. Somehow the clues, through the miracle of the writer's subconscious and a little judicious rewriting, have pointed to the murderer all along.

Still other writers mix a little of both methods. Cold calculations about clues and the killer's identity are leavened by the spontaneous generosity of the writer's muse. The writer is as surprised as the reader to discover why the killer hums but never sings and how that fits so perfectly into the puzzle.

No one can tell you what method to use to create a perfect blend of detective's plot and back plot. Each writer must discover what works best for her. But the wise writer takes the time after the book is written and before the rewriting to ask herself, "What is the plot? Does it make sense? Is it complete?"

The even wiser writer also asks the same questions about the back plot. The wisest writer also remembers that in the back plot the killer is the major protagonist, and it is here where the true heart of the novel lies.

Now tell me the plot of "The Hound of the Baskervilles."

NOTE:  I'll be posting the next worksheet, tomorrow.