A book is a complicated intellectual product. The process of writing a book takes a lot of your time, energy and nerves, that is why it is really important to have a good start. Lots of things depend on it. First, a good start can guarantee your thoughts to be literally embodied in your book. How to let yourself the opportunity to reach this bright and worthy goal?
Book Writing: The Plan
It is especially important to think on a strategical planning. You can save lots of time and nerves with its help. What does this mean?
Planning allows you to avoid unnecessary thoughts and running through your text while having no clue what to write about in the next paragraph of your text. Still, you’ve got to leave yourself some space to show your creativeness.
So, before starting to write a book, mark your target and its strategical perspectives. Ways of achieving your goal are the ones which stay under the power of your creative genius. That is why you shouldn’t think about planning to be the killer of your fantasy and its crazy drive. This plan is actually the scene to implement your thoughts!
Also, planning is important because the author won’t lose their time asking themselves questions: “What should my hero do then?”, “What should be the next turn of the story?”, etc. The author with a plan clearly understands the next episode is to lead the reader to a certain result. This could be a determined emotion, or the internal change of a character, something that matters for your main idea to be implemented. The author only needs to answer the question: “How to get to that point?” And that is the moment when Her Majesty Imagination appears on the scene.
When starting a work on your book, it is important to understand three key moments of every story:
- Idea;
- Characters;
- Plot.
The success of your story depends on a harmonic mix of these components. You better devote enough time to develop them well. Preparations with a plot, heroes and ideas determine how you’ll move on with your writing.
Book Writing: Idea
The idea of your book has to be clear for you. If the main idea of your story says that love is more valuable than money, you should provide the development of this thought throughout all the pages of your story. Don’t fall aside, don’t write about love to be evil or about the possibility to buy one’s love with “MasterCard”. Prove the main idea of your book with the life and actions of your characters. Make your heroes choose between money and love. And then, persuade the reader that your thought is right.
If talking about numerous ideas in one book, you should think on them before you start writing, too. You’ve got to understand what is the new idea to serve for in your story. The main thought passes through all the pages, other ideas are needed to show it from another viewpoint or to describe some of its shades. Don’t turn your book into a cocktail. If you’ve got a million of ideas in your mind, write a million of books then!
Book Writing: Characters
Characters are engines of your story. It comes to life once they come onto the scene. You can implement your book’s creative idea only with the help of your heroes. Characters require devoting much time to them, because they are those who will lead readers through the pages of your story. And the reader shouldn’t be bored of them.
The main principle of a hero’s appearance on the scene is their expediency. Characters should be born with a certain task, with the author’s need to show the idea. You shouldn’t think out hundreds of heroes for your story, this doesn’t make sense. Your reader can get confused with numerous faces, and not to understand your ideas.
Before your start writing, describe your characters. They should be known and understandable for you.
There are two ways to get familiar with a character. The first one can be called classical: you describe your hero while answering questions about them. Age, sex, habits, features, appearance, etc.
The second way is more interesting. You get familiar with your character using the visualization technique. Going this way, you can get a “live” meeting with your character, you can imagine their reaction onto different situations. Knowing your characters, you’ll save much time while creating your book.
Book Writing: Plot
The plot is the third important element of a successful start. You build it up with the help of your idea and characters. Idea is the field. Every character is a car. And your plot is the road. You can drive without any road, of course. But this would be a lot worse than if you went through the highway. So, pay special attention to this point.
The plot is what allows you to show your idea in the way which is easy and understandable for the reader. Building up your plot using the suitable elements, you make the idea of your book come into the reader’s mind more clearly. If the plot is fine, characters are developed naturally and harmonically, as if they were real.
So, to start writing your book, provide serious preparation keeping up three points mentioned above. After that, your book will approach you with the highest possible speed. If you work on it hard & regularly.