5 Tips for Plotting Your First Novel
Congrats on starting your journey as an author!
Writing your first novel is exhilarating. Putting those first words to paper feels like opening the floodgates to a story that’s been begging to be written.
But you’ll soon find that it’s a huge endeavour. Your characters have to feel like real people and move the narrative forward and be witty and fun. Your plot has to be logical and complex. It’s a lot to take on!
To tame the overwhelm and not get stuck in a plot hole, start by laying out some of the foundation for your story in a notebook or word document first.
Plotting out your novel before you start writing gives you a base to build your novel and the confidence to finish that first draft.
Here’s an editor’s top five tips for plotting your first novel.
1. Start with characters
Characters are arguably more important than plot in Western literature. Everything that happens (the plot) is to serve the main character’s journey.
Your character should be trying to achieve one thing when you start writing and end up learning a related lesson that they’ve resisted throughout because of a misbelief.
If you know what your character wants, what they need to learn, and what misbelief they have that keeps them from learning the lesson, you’re well on your way to compelling character arc.
Quick Tip: Character sheets like these ones—created for you by an editor who understands a character arc—can help get you started on plotting your character’s journey.
2. Keep the premise simple
Don’t overcomplicate the premise. Readers want to know what the story’s about in the first chapter. They don’t want to be trying to figure it out halfway through the book.
Think how the premise of Pride and Prejudice is that the Bennet sisters must marry for money to ensure their family doesn’t fall into poverty.
There’s obviously more to Pride and Prejudice than that, but the premise is simple. Austen builds the romantic plot and subsequent subplots on this simple premise.
Quick Tip: It’s easier to add layers of complexity when the heart of the premise is simple.
3. Read up on story structure
Readers have expectations (even if they’re subconscious) about how a novel is supposed to unfold. That’s why best sellers tend to follow a tried-and-true structure.
For example, if you’re writing romance, your readers will expect a happy ending. If you don’t know what that structure is, you’ll want to check some story structures so you can meet your readers’ expectations.
You don’t have to follow any structure perfectly. But make sure you know when you’re stepping outside of expectations so you don’t get angry readers.
Quick Tip: Save the Cat! Writes a Novel is currently the most popular story structure for novelists, but there are lots of others out there. (Romancing the Beat is a good one for romance authors.)
4. Outline but don’t stick to it
Outline to know where you’re going, but let yourself go off script if it feels right.
For example, if you’ve plotted out exactly how your quiet main character who doesn’t believe she’s worthy of love is going to fall in love with a top exec at her firm, but along the way, you find she’s actually going for her artsy, kind best friend, explore that!
Planning out what’s happening and when in your novel can save you time and keep your writing on track. But sometimes, your characters will decide to do what they want, and I suggest letting yourself go with the flow when that happens.
Quick Tip: Outlining isn’t for everyone, but I recommend jotting down the start and end points you have in mind so you have a direction to write in. If you go in a different direction, celebrate it!
5. Use cause and effect to your advantage
Everything happens for a reason in a novel. Real life is full of coincidences, but for a novel to work, the plot needs to feel like each action has a consequence.
If your reader comes away feeling like a bunch of things happened but they aren’t quite sure how everything ties together, then something went wrong. The events of the book should feel not only like they’re connected but like they’re building on each other.
When everything is connected and an action leads to a reaction and then another action, the reader feels like there’s a cohesive narrative and will read late into the night to see what happens.
Quick Tip: To make sure the dominoes keep toppling each other, ask yourself what your main character is doing in each scene to move toward their goal.
In conclusion . . .
Writing your first novel can be both fun and daunting. A novel has so many parts to it!
Taking some time to lay the groundwork for your novel before you start writing means when you do start putting words to the page, you have a good idea of what you’re doing.
Your book will evolve and change as you write—and that’s something you should celebrate!—but following the above five tips is a great starting point.
Have more questions about getting started writing your book?
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