What I Learned From Writing Two-and-a-half Books
For novelists with an architect’s mind and a gardener’s soul.
In 2019, I decided to embark on a journey I’d fantasized over for years: writing a novel. It was an aspiration of mine since high school, and one that I’d planned for and studied over the following decade— watching vlogs and reading books on how to construct plots, pace stories, edit, revise, and so on. But one February morning when I was barricaded in my New Jersey townhouse by a mountain of snow, I decided to act on my dream. And less than a year later, 2,000 miles away in sunny San Diego, I finished that first draft.
A premise and cast of characters that began life as an ethereal thought in the shower were now alive in 101,341 words on the page — or Scrivener files, rather. I thought I had made something worth publishing, a world in which my friends and family could engross themselves.
But, when I combed back through the first draft, the reality was that it wasn’t very good.
My first alpha reader told me as much, too. The characters were great and prose wasn’t bad, they said, but the plot jerked them around with promises unceremoniously dashed against the rocks and an ending that felt half-baked (which, with hindsight, it was). The realization disheartened me, but I didn’t give up. It was only after writing another book and a half that I realized the problem: I needed to learn my own style of writing.
This article is intended for those who are also struggling to write a book that they later intend to publish. I want to make it clear upfront: I’m not an expert. I’ve not yet published a book, nor have I finished editing my second book; however, if you’re in the same boat as me, maybe my experiences and insights on my own process will provide some assistance.
Book #1: What didn’t work for me
As you can probably imagine, I like to tell stories. They’re why I studied history as an undergrad, and why I was drawn to the allure of the entertainment industry in Los Angeles. Stories are the peanut butter to my jelly.
When I tell spoken stories, I usually construct them as I go, planting seeds informed by the storytelling patterns I’ve observed throughout my life, and seeing how they grow. In other words, I’m a “gardener,” as George R. R. Martin calls us.
But telling stories to your friends and writing a book are very different things.
Writing a book is harder, obviously. Most novels contain 90,000 to 110,000 words, give or take a few outliers like the aforementioned George Martin. There are also many moving parts that are unique to genre conventions, story elements, and context. You have to worry about the large components like plot development, story arcs, and character arcs, but also sweat over the glue that’s holding it all together. Does your character’s internal journey mesh with the events of the plot? Does the ending work for both the main character and the story? Are there too many side characters, or not enough?
There’s a lot of critical thinking involved, which I didn’t do nearly enough when writing my first book.
The main problem I encountered after I put to bed the final chapter was that my story had morphed over time. I had started writing a story about a young queer boy at the nadir of his life, fighting to survive on the streets of a near-future, dystopian-lite Taipei; but, I ended with a Bond-esque adventure romp/meet-cute ship fulfillment. The plot radically diverged from the character’s established internal journey during the second act, and they continued in spite of one another rather than in lock-step. As a result, the events in the climax seem like they’d provoke a very different response from the main character than what was on the page.
When writing this, it didn’t occur to me that I was generating this systemic problem, but that’s because I wasn’t planning anything in advance. My “gardening” strategy had always worked for my spoken word, or even short stories, but not when applied to something over 100,000 words.
In the end, I needed to shelve the book. I remember feeling devastated at the time — after all, I had poured my soul into the project for seven months and assumed I’d have a manuscript ready to submit to literary agents by spring 2020. This was before I learned that many writers don’t publish their first project and that a lot of people don’t finish their first novel, which eased my heartburn and recontextualized my first project. Although, what really helped me was trying again.
Book #2: Its beginnings was nearly its end
After a few months of calcifying on my couch following the stay home order, I felt the drive to start a new project once more. Except for this time, I was going to do things differently.
I was going to write a fantasy, and I was going to outline everything.
It made sense that I should swing to the opposite side of the supposed writers’ pendulum and be an “architect” instead of a “gardener.” Anyone that knows me well can attest to the fact I don’t leave many things up to chance. Besides storytelling, I map out most other aspects of my life. There’s a reason I got an M.A. in Urban Planning. Planning is my thing, so why not apply it to my writing?
I had been listening to the back-catalog of Writing Excuses, a podcast hosted by Brandon Sanderson, Dan Wells, Mary Robinette Kowal, and Howard Tayler. One of the tips I’d picked up from the podcast was to write an outline starting from the story’s ending. Coming up with something cool and climactic first and then discovering how you could lead a story to that conclusion seemed logical to me, especially since my first book had veered wildly off course. I decided that was as good of a strategy as any.
The outline began with a blank sheet of printer paper. First, I jotted down the plot points from the conclusion I wanted and worked backward until I had reached the beginning. The end product resembled a giant, hideously complex, upside-down pine tree, but it was operational. There were three acts scribbled out in bullet points, with story beats clearly syncing together. I had successfully made an outline, and I hated it.
The process had taken a lot of energy, and worse: it sapped all my motivation to tell the story. My favorite part of writing fiction is the act of creation, and I had spent all of it hatching together a messy, graphite pine tree. Don’t get me wrong — I still tried to translate my outline into a book, but could barely make it through writing the first chapter. So, for a second time, I resigned to shelve the project. (Put a pin in that.)
Book #2.1: The hybrid
Frustrated by my experience with planning a book, I figured I’d try a third approach after a month or so of not writing. I sat down one morning before the sun had risen, armed with my laptop and a cup of hojicha, and began to type.
Picture an island like Yakushima, where waves crashed against cliffs in the blanket of night. A woman sails into an outlet, hunting for trinkets left by The Ancients — a civilization wholly unknown — when suddenly, a bright green light overtakes her. She finds herself imprisoned in a doorless, metal room with technologies she’d never seen before, and worse: she’s not alone.
I had birthed a premise that excited me. When the first chapter was written, I moved on to a second chapter, and then a third, allowing my creative self free rein to explore this world. Only after I’d written six chapters did I start to plan.
Since I had started this project gardening-style, I couldn’t outline from the end very easily; hence, I returned to the chapters I’d written and constructed an outline of the events, character motivations, and so on. This allowed me to project events out to the climax.
And there was where I hit the brick wall. It was the Book #1 problem all over again. I had this exciting premise, an action-packed second act, but no conclusion that felt right.
What was I doing wrong?
The Answer
I decided to talk with a friend about the challenges I was having with novels. She had never written a book before, but it didn’t matter. Her style of thinking and mine are radically different in many ways but also complement one another. I look at a garden and get lost in its weeds, wanting to capture its colors, smells, and sounds; she looks at the garden and sees its harvest.
Consequently, after listening to me ramble about Book #1 and my subsequent two failed attempts for a few minutes, she immediately identified my problem.
“You’re lacking a thesis.”
“Pardon?”
“What question are you interrogating with this story?” she asked, referring to my completed outline of Book #2. “It sounds like you want to say something about democracies, but you’ve got all these competing themes.”
She was right. It was why writing an ending was so difficult, and it seemed so obvious once she’d said it. I needed to think clearly about what I wanted to say with my stories.
“Maybe once you answer that question, you can try and make a simpler outline — one that hits the core plot and character beats you wanna hit,” she suggested, “and then, you can flesh things out as you go.”
If I weren’t chatting with her through FaceTime, I would have given her a hug.
“Ashley, you’re a genius.”
After the call, I spent time thinking carefully about what I wanted to say with Book #2, along with how the story could illustrate my thinking and beliefs. Then, I dusted off my outline and took a chainsaw to the pine tree. In a matter of hours, I had a minimal viable product before my eyes, one ready to be used.
Months had passed since I first plotted Book #2, so when I started to write in Scrivener, I realized that my imagination was churning away as if I’d just come up with the ideas on the spot. The bare-bones outline gave me the freedom to do exploratory writing while heading to a clear destination, and I constructed a chapter-level plan after about 20,000 words in. 55,972 words later, I can definitely say that I discovered a process that works for me.
Conclusion
To summarize what I learned: think about the statement you’re trying to make with your ideas and develop a conclusion that demonstrates or aligns with that thesis. Come up with a basic path to your ending, and then explore the scenery along the way. If you’re anything like me, it will work like magic!
