No Plot? No Problem!: A Low-Stress, High-Velocity Guide to Writing a Novel in 30 Days (13 page)

WEEK ONE, DAY 6

TRUMPETS BLARING, ANGELS SINGING, AND TRIUMPH ON THE WIND (CONT'D)

[Today's Goal: Reach 10,002 words]

WEEK ONE EXERCISES

In addition to week-specific issues and tips, we’ll also highlight a couple of exercises you can do to help keep your creative juices flowing.

-“Tell Me about Your Uncle”: Fleshing Out Characters through Random Conversations with Friends and Strangers

As any psychologist will tell you, truth is definitely stranger than fiction. If you’re having trouble coming up with interesting attributes and histories for your characters, tap into the millions of hilarious, wonderful characters already in orbit around you. Grab your notebook, call a friend, and ask them to tell you everything they know about their strangest relative.

Even some of the most mundane stories (“I had an uncle who wore flannel shirts every single day of his life. He used to sneak bologna into the zoo to throw to the gibbons because he always thought they looked too skinny.”) will often spark ideas about potential characters and stories. This tactic also works well with strangers, especially cute ones who will no doubt be impressed by this crazy novel project. So the next time you’re in line at the grocery store or sitting in a coffeeshop and someone catches your eye, take out your pen and go harvest their family. You’ll net a tremendous haul of anecdotes that you can steal for your story, and they’ll come away telling their friends about the hot writer they met in the check-out line.

I, COUCH POTATO

Ah, the rigors of homework. The second exercise this week involves watching TV. Pick any show you enjoy. Just make sure it’s fictional, and make sure it isn’t one that you love so much that you will lose track of the assignment. Which is this: Sit down in front of the boob tube, put on your thinking cap, and watch critically.

Whatever show you’ve chosen, from the Simpsons to the Sopranos, keep an eye out for how the writers tackle the same challenges you’re facing in your novel: trying to fit a lot of story into a little time. Most TV shows have a main plot garlanded by one or two subplots. Some give each of the show’s main characters a role in processing a single plot.

How many plots does your show juggle? How long does it wait before introducing the Central Problem? How and when does it use foreshadowing to let the viewers know what’s coming? How is the story divvied up between the many characters? Is the outcome predictable? If you liked some aspect of the show’s story, are there structural devices—pacing, narration, anything—you can steal from it?

Dissecting a TV show is a great way to help you see the tropes of storytelling laid bare. If you’re hungering for more storytelling models, pop in a DVD and watch how the same conflicts are handled in a movie. As embarrassing as it is to report—and this secret does not leave the pages of this book—I modeled the pacing of my most recent month-long novel on the animated movie Antz and a re-run of Cheers.

Sigh.

Nobel Prize Committee, here I come, right? But whatever works, works. And TV shows and movies are a treasure trove of storytelling wisdom, both good and bad.

WEEK ONE, DAY 7

TRUMPETS BLARING, ANGELS SINGING, AND TRIUMPH ON THE WIND (CONT'D)

[Today's Goal: Reach 11,669 words]

--------------------TIMING IS EVERYTHING: OPTIMIZING YOUR NOVELING TIME BY FINDING

YOUR GOLDEN HOURS

One of the greatest lessons you’ll learn over the next four weeks is that it’s possible to churn out inspired prose regardless of how tired and unhappy you are when you sit down to write. That said, everyone has certain hours of the day where the brain is just better-oiled than others. Finding out when these juicy hours fall, and spending as much time at the keyboard during them, will offer a tremendous boost to your book. These golden hours vary from person to person: Mine happen to run from about 9:00 A.M., when the coffee first hits, to 1:00 P.M., when all I want to do is crawl under my desk and fall asleep. If your most alert, creative hours occur in the morning (while you’re at work or school), you can still make a point of exploiting them on weekends. Ditto for the night owls who just start hitting their stride around 3:00 A.M.

And whenever you have an especially challenging scene to write, try putting it off until you can have a go at it from within your golden hours’ friendly synaptic confines.

--------------------------------------KEEPING BETH FROM BERTHA: AVOIDING THE DREADED “NAME DRIFT”

As you christen each of your characters, be sure to jot their names down on a piece of paper that you keep close to your writing area. You’ll be amazed how easily a Mike can become a Mick (who will in turn become a Matt) without some handy visual reminder to help you keep all the identities straight.

--------------------------------------THOUGHTS FROM THE TRENCHES: NANOWRIMO WINNERS ON THE FIRST DAYS OF THE

ADVENTURE

“The best thing about Week One is that it’s all there, baby, a big wide world for me to create. It could go anywhere. The worst thing is that there are too many different directions that I could go, and I get hung up on picking the ‘right’ one.”

—Cybele May, 37, three-time NaNoWriMo winner from Los Angeles

“The best thing about the first week for me is the energy I get from being able to finally write something specific after holding back for the month (or at least the few weeks) before the contest starts. The worst part is the week just before NaNo starts, when I’m absolutely convinced that all the ideas that have been bouncing around in my head will completely disappear, and I’ll be left looking like an idiot, unable to string a coherent sentence together if my life depended on it.”

—Michael Sirois, 57, one-time NaNoWriMo winner from Houston, Texas

“Week One is when the bad-idea naps start happening. At first, I had this notion that a good power nap early in the evening would give you a formidable burst of writing energy later. Instead, what it gives you is an accidental good night’s sleep.”

—Brian Baldi, 30, one-time NaNoWriMo winner from Amherst, Massachusetts

“The first week, like the weeks after it, are analogous to age. The first ten thousand words are like your first decade on Earth, flying by in a rush. The second ten grand is like adolescence—full of high highs and low lows, all awkward and gangly and manic. The twenty to thirty period is one of confusion and uncertainty, when you’re trying to figure out what you want to be. From thirty-to forty-thousand, you get a bit sad: Suddenly you see what you have and there’s no turning back and you’ve got to play out your hand. The last ten thousand is a total breeze, as you see the finish line and you’re just wrapping things up. Then you die.”

—Dan Strachota, 35, five-time NaNoWriMo winner from San Francisco

--------------------

CHAPTER 6

WEEK TWO, DAY 8

STORM CLOUDS, PLOT FLASHES, AND THE RETURN OF REALITY

[Today's Goal: Reach 13,336 words]

Dear Writer,

One week in, and we’re right on target: Our homes are a mess, our friends are annoyed, and our bosses have started casting suspicious, sidelong glances at us as they walk by our cubicles. It’s been a promising beginning. In the last seven days alone, you’ve written a small novella’s worth of people and places. And you’ve felt the sexy click of your imagination as it locks on target, the muscley thrill of your bad-ass creative self rolling up its sleeves and wading into the fray. There’s much to celebrate. But sadly, there’s also some bad news on the way. The No Plot? No Problem! team of literary meteorologists have radioed an urgent message back from the noveling front. There’s a storm rolling in from the west; a black howler of a tempest. And it’s headed your way. Welcome to Week Two. If you brought a poncho, now would be a good time to get it out. The storm will likely break in three or four days, exactly at the point when the novelty of the event starts to fade, and your book starts getting more demanding.

Cue thunder. Cue lightning. And cue some big-time writerly grumpiness. Those first thunderclaps mark an essential turning point in novel writing; it’s the place where the cast has been introduced, the stage has been set, and everything is primed for the story to unfold. Having reached this stage, most novelists would pat themselves on the back and head off to Majorca for a month to celebrate their accomplishments.

But because of the pressing timeframe, you barely have time to catch your breath, much less catch a plane. For better or worse, the next great stage—plot building—is upon us. Yep. You’ve wrapped up the exposition, and now something book-like has to happen. Someone needs to fall in love. Or get amnesia. Or go on a road trip. But who? And how?

The questions just keep piling up, and your first impulse will likely be to chuck the whole thing and go back to the blissful life you led before this five-headed literary monster began devouring all your free time.

As you write your way through the next seven days, know that Week Two hurts so bad because you’re making huge strides in your book, solving a year’s worth of plot and character problems in one overcaffeinated week.

The answers will come. Just keep at it, and before you know it, Week Two will be a distant memory. The sun will be shining again, the way will be clear, and the writing will become fun once more. And Week Three! Oh, don’t get me started about the wonders of Week Three. There are some amazing things on your literary horizons. The kinds of breakthroughs that will make you laugh and cry and shake your head pityingly at friends and family members who wasted this month on empty pursuits like conversation, bathing, and sleep.

The only way to get to that self-righteously pitying stage, though, is by hurling yourself directly into the eye of Week Two’s storms. Now is the time to batten down the hatches and throw yourself into your story with everything you’ve got.

You’ve made such great progress, writer. And the best is just around the bend. WEEK TWO, DAY 9

STORM CLOUDS, PLOT FLASHES, AND THE RETURN OF REALITY (CONT'D)

[Today's Goal: Reach 15,003 words]

WEEK TWO ISSUES

STILL NO PLOT? STILL NO PROBLEM.

If you already know the intricacies of how your novel is going to unfold, Week Two is the point when you’ll begin putting your fiendish plan into action. The players are in position, and it’s time to tip that first domino, to open the story’s throttle and watch it speed ahead. If you still don’t know what your characters are doing in your book, Week Two is the point when you should panic.

Hee hee.

Just kidding.

Having a shaky, hazy, or problematic plot heading into Week Two is absolutely fine, and is a predicament common to many month-long novelists. I guarantee that if you meet your word count quota over the next seven days, you’ll have a much, much clearer idea of what your book is about by the end of the week.

As I said before, plot is just the movement of your characters through time, over the course of your book. If you’re still not clear on your book’s plot, the best thing you can do for your story is to really let your characters move this week. Give them space to show parts of themselves they may have kept hidden in the first seven days. Encourage them to act out, to indulge their desires, no matter how zany or destructive those desires may be. Allow change, and plot will happen.

CHARACTER COUPS

If you’re have trouble seeing a possible plot in your novel, one of the problems may be your growing boredom or disenchantment with your main characters. If you’ve been noticing that, despite your best intentions, the camera lens of your book tends to drift to the incidental members of the cast—the best friend, the co-worker, or the family iguana, say—it may be a sign that the book would be better recentered in their orbit. Demoting your hero from savior to sidekick and promoting some of your supporting characters to starring roles happens a lot in the figuring-it-out-as-you-go world of month-long novel-writing. Before you do anything drastic, sit down and think about story directions and exciting imbroglios that might spin-off from your new potential protagonist(s). If you come up with a few good ones, or find yourself salivating at the thought of letting someone else take the spotlight from the dullard currently narrating your story, a character coup may be for you.

FALLING BEHIND AND THE KEY TO THE VIP LOUNGE

Okay, let’s be honest: There will be days in this wild escapade when you’re just not feeling it. When your brain has checked out and neglected to leave a forwarding address, and it’s all you can do to get the food from the dinner plate to your mouth before you collapse, asleep, at the table. These days will come more often than you might like in Week Two, and to avoid getting overwhelmed, now is a great time to give yourself the occasional novel-free night. Even if you’re behind on your word count, taking a night off to replenish those overtaxed synapses will likely end up boosting your productivity in the long run.

Whenever you do skip a writing day, though, be sure to make up the words within a couple of days. As you know all too well by now, every day you skip steers you another 1,667 words off course. Accumulate three or four wordless days in a row, and the book becomes less of a spontaneous creative experiment and more of a ten-round grudge match between you and your hulking literary deficit. Staying on pace, on the other hand, grants you access to the No Plot? No Problem! VIP Writer’s Lounge. This swank place is the finest writer’s nook in the world; the coffee is free, the people are friendly and inspiring, and the chairs are all orthopedic custom jobbies with expansive lumbar support. The VIP Lounge is an ideal refuge from some of the rough weather that will be passing over your novel in Week Two. Do what you can to haul yourself up into its ritzy confines, but remember that staying reasonably sane is the week’s ultimate goal. If you have to take on some word debt to keep burnout at bay, do so. You can always set up residency in the VIP Lounge next week. WEEK TWO, DAY 10