How to write a book part two: Before you start

This is a continuation of my series on navigating the writing process. To see my first post in the series, click here.

As I said in the first entry in this series, there is no wrong way to begin writing. Start with what works best for you. However, before anything can be written, more planning and pre-manuscript work may need to be done first. Maybe you want to get a more fleshed-out idea of your story as a whole or you want to create a profile for your protagonist or other characters so they are more rich and developed.

 I, personally, try to chart out my writing beat by beat. This is essentially an expansion of my summary where I try to list out everything that needs to happen in terms of plot and character development. This doesn’t need to be concrete, and you can figure out the details later. For instance, I may know that if I want my character to have a final showdown against their nemesis at the climax of the story, they need to have an established relationship. They need to have previous confrontations so that they have the proper animosity in that final showdown. If you want there to be personal stakes like the antagonist having kidnapped the hero’s love interest, you know that they need to have absconded with them at some point.

This wider summary is a chance to start figuring out what needs to be in the book—and where it needs to go. You can start vague with an idea like “the protagonist has a showdown with the antagonist during the climax in Act Three, so they need to meet each other in Acts One or Two.” Then get more specific: “The climax occurs because the antagonist kidnapped the protagonist’s love interest, therefore I want the antagonist to kidnap the love interest at the end of Act Two.” In turn, this means their first meeting needs to happen earlier in the story than the end of Act Two. Perhaps the protagonist fails to stop the antagonist from kidnapping the love interest at the end of Act Two because the protagonist is not brave enough. This means that the protagonist has to learn bravery before they meet again at the climax of the story in order to rescue them, so something has to happen in Act Three where they gain courage.

Writing in this way can be a bit like a Sudoku puzzle. At first, you only know where a small amount of information is located. Yet, by working out through logic where those few pieces fit, you can see where corresponding pieces must fit within the narrative (or where they will not fit). Once you see where enough pieces fit, you will start to get a clearer picture of what the final story will look like. Eventually, you can even break this down further into a chapter-by-chapter summary and maybe even further into a scene-by-scene summary.

Some writers skip this step. They prefer to write in a more organic, spontaneous manner. In the writing community, this is often referred to as the “pants-er method.” It’s named this way because these writers “fly by the seat of their pants.” Those who like to plan things out and strictly structure their stories ahead of time are often referred to as “planners” because they plan things out and want to know what they are writing toward ahead of time.

Pants-ers like to allow the story to guide them rather than them guiding the story. There is merit to this. It can help make the story more unpredictable, can ensure motivations for characters feel natural, and helps authors avoid falling into the trap of inserting things into the story simply because it furthers the plot even though it otherwise doesn’t make sense.

For instance, if a character is kidnapped and escapes, why don’t they ask someone on the street to call the police for help instead of trying to stop the kidnappers themselves? You, the writer, know that you want the victim to fight back against the kidnappers, but logically it doesn’t make sense unless you take measures to circumvent such a plot hole (like they’re in the middle of nowhere or it was established earlier that cell service was down). The pants-er method makes it easier to avoid this because the characters are acting in the moment. The downside of the pants-er method is that this can easily lead to the writer being stuck. If the victim just calls the police, then they never confront their kidnapper, never grow as a character, and you end up with a flat, boring ending.

As is probably evident in my Sudoku method, I definitely fall more in the planner camp than the pants-er camp. However, in my experience, there has to be a little planning in every pants-er and a little improvisation in every planner. A story with no structure is very difficult to write and can often lead to dead ends, writer’s block, or a lack of satisfaction at where the story goes. Likewise, even the most dedicated planner needs some improvisation in their story. If a character turns out more annoying than comical, you need to adjust how that character is presented. If you write two characters and they have unforeseen romantic chemistry that wasn’t included in the original outline, then perhaps that needs to be added in.

Another key facet for many writers in the pre-writing phase is doing research. For a genre like historical fiction, I highly recommend it. Learn about what you are writing about. For instance, if you have a story set in World War II, learn about the war and culture in the 1940s. If you start writing without doing this research, it usually becomes glaringly obvious. Historical inaccuracies are the most visible (don’t describe a character being an Air Force pilot if the Air Force wasn’t established yet) but not having a grasp of the language used at the time, pasting modern perspectives on characters from other time periods, or having them not act or think like people did at the time can stand out unless such characterization is backed up by a solid backstory and proper character development.

Nor is this limited to historical fiction. If you have a character in a modern contemporary setting, but who is a doctor, while research may not be necessary to describe their home life, it can be pretty clear to readers if they do not sound like a doctor while they are on the job or if they are using inaccurate medical terms or act inappropriately in regard to medical practices.

Character building is also a common technique that many writers use before the writing process begins in earnest. This means learning who they are as the writer so you can better describe them and show who they are throughout the narrative. If they are very tough and angry character, you want to know why they act tough and are so angry all the time. Perhaps they lived on the street growing up, so they had to develop a hard outer shell to protect themselves. Maybe they were taught by a parent or mentor figure that acting that way is the only way to get respect from others.

Ask yourself questions that may not necessarily appear on the page, secrets known only to the author or secret facts about the character that are merely hinted at in the text. Maybe that tough and angry character is shown having an otherwise uncharacteristic love of dogs because their pet dog was the only creature who showed them unconditional love when they were a child. Their childhood may not come up in the story but it’s the sort of detail that makes a character feel like a real person rather than a trope, cliché, or bland replaceable drone.

You can also ask yourself details which may or may not be relevant to the story. Do they have scars or injuries? What makes them happy? What makes them sad? What do they do on their days off? Even a cold-blooded hitman sits down, eats dinner, and watches TV. What do they eat, what do they watch—and why? Are they as cautious and anxious as they are when they’re on the job or is this a moment of vulnerability and relaxation for them?

This also is a good way to form a good idea of their appearance. One of the best pieces of character design advice I ever heard is that an iconic character should be identifiable by their silhouette. If I showed you a silhouette of a muscular man with a cape and pointy ears, you could tell it was Batman. If I showed you a silhouette of a slim lady in a coat, brimmed hat, and holding an umbrella, you could tell it was Mary Poppins. While not every character, especially in the case of minor characters, has to be so distinct, the reader should always be able to have a clear view of who they are and what they look like. Describe their eyes; are they kind, intimidating, always squinting, bugging out? Are they in designer clothes, jeans and a hoodie, a 70’s tracksuit? Is their hair unruly in long curls, high and tight, messy like a pile of straw? Is their build thin, fat, or muscular?

There are numerous checklists and forms that authors and publishers have created to give other writers a blueprint for mapping out who a character is. Here are some links to some examples.

One Stop for Writers has a good one I’ve used in the past. It requires a subscription but comes with a free trial here.
Here is another from Crystal MM Burton on Pinterest.
Here is a pretty basic one from DearWriters on Tumblr.

There are plenty of ways to prepare yourself so you have more tools in your arsenal before you start writing. Don’t feel you need to rush into your story—but don’t use it as an excuse to procrastinate either. The important thing is to keep that momentum going and always be making progress, even if that progress doesn’t necessarily mean writing text. We’ll talk more about that in a future post.