187 | TTT011 | New Ground, New Problems & New Ideas
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187 | TTT011 | New Ground, New Problems & New Ideas
August 5, 2024
Welcome back!
Today's Topic: New Ground, New Problems & New Ideas
Moving from old material to the new
Ignoring mind games
New stuff that helps shape my writing
// CHAPTER 1: MOVING FROM OLD MATERIAL TO NEW
We've talked about this a bit. The fact that I had written a good 5 or 6 chapters of my WIP back in the day. Back when I first got the Big Idea.
The juices were flowing, and I just dove in head first and started writing. This was a long time ago. Not even sure how long ago. But definitely long enough ago to where I had no concept about what Story Structure was.
To me - an author simply sat down and knocked out a 400 page novel. Or, if you were a plotter, you came up with a bullet point outline of the high level plot structure - and then sat down and knocked it out.
In this world - all you really needed was time, and motivation. If you could force yourself to get up early, or stay up later than everyone else - you could knock out a few pages each time and eventually you'd have your first draft.
So that's the world I was living in when I wrote those first 5-6 chapters. And looking back - it shows.
Not that it was terrible writing. The Big Idea is still in there. And I still got chills reading through it. Because the story was there, dying to get out.
But it was like driving a fast car down a dead end road. I was quickly to the end of that road, and trying to figure out how to get back on the main highway that led to the end of my story.
Probably why I stopped writing back then and just sat on it.
So after countless books, podcast episodes, articles, blog posts, and YouTube videos. I set out to get this thing done.
But I now had the filter of Story Structure. Thanks to books like The Artist's Way, On Writing, and the big one - the Story Grid methodology. Along with others like Story, Big Magic, and Story Genius.
These books did nothing less than blow my mind - and give me a whole new appreciation for the craft.
And unfortunately - I knew I had to start over on my WIP.
So I did. And I started with the plotting, the planning. And spent hours on things like Story Structure, Characters, Settings, World Building, etc.
And when I had enough of that down on paper - I returned to writing - just with a whole new perspective.
So this is what I mean when I say, "Moving from old material to new."
Because I had 5-6 chapters - and there was some really good stuff in there. But there was also some really bad stuff - and it was written in a format I knew was both old school, and problematic at the same time.
My chapters were way too long. There were easily 2-3 scenes inside each chapter - but they were functioning more like chapters with running plot lines and connected content.
Not that scenes shouldn't have this connection to the larger story - but it feels like things have changed in the world of storytelling. Gone are the days where novels had 20-30 chapters. Today, it seems like writers are sticking to shorter scenes (averaging 1,500 words) and almost using their scenes as chapters. One of my favorite writers, Michael Crichton did this in his books. Short, concise scenes (some only a page or two) kept you turning the pages of the book.
The one I just completed (Eruption, co-written by Michael Crichton and James Patterson) ended up with 109 Chapters over 432 pages. That's an average of 4 pages per chapter (or scene).
In contrast, the first Harry Potter book, The Sorcerer's Stone by J.K. Rowling followed the previously mentioned style.
I love the book, the series and the author. But this was my biggest frustration.
The book was 309 pages long and only had 17 Chapters. That's a whopping 18 pages per chapter on average.
Now, nothing wrong with either format. But for me - I love the shorter style - as I'm able to pick the book up at any point in the day and get a scene or two read - always feeling like I left at a breaking point. Nothing is more irritating than getting halfway through a chapter and having to stick a pin in it. In the middle of a scene, or a sequence. Probably just the perfectionism coming out in me...
So back to my original work. Long chapters, that probably included multiple scenes.
So when I started plotting out my novel - I read back through my chapters and broke them into scenes.
Then I rewrote each scene as an actual scene - abiding by the 5 Commandments of Storytelling. Making each had an:
Inciting Incident
Turning Point (Progressive Complication)
Crisis
Climax
Resolution
This went pretty quickly - and what I realized is that I was also creating sequences.
My Prologue is made up of two scenes - combining to form one sequence
Then the first three scenes of my book form a sequence
As do the next three scenes
I've found that three scenes work well to form a sequence before jumping away to the other set of characters. However, this won't already be the case. Upcoming I can already see two and four scene sequences. And I even have a standalone scene that will be a sequence unto itself.
But the other thing happening right now is that I'm coming to the end of the work I had already done. As I chop up the long chapters, I'm finding that there are scenes missing, and scenes that I don't really need.
When I find a missing scene - I have to write it from scratch. Which interestingly enough has been a scary thing. Probably because it's been so long since I've done it. I've spent years editing work I wrote a long time ago - so this is new - back to coming up with the idea and fleshing it our on a blank page.
And I'm down to the final 2 or 3 scenes from the past work. So as soon as those are re-written I'll be back to writing everything net new.
Scary, but at the same time I can't wait - as this is the true life of a writer right?
// CHAPTER 2: IGNORING MIND GAMES
I used the word scary - which means I'm feeling negative emotions when writing new stuff.
But why? Why am I scared? Why am I not just excited and ready to go?
Well, from the world of psychology - we know that feelings cannot be controlled. We can control our thinking and our behaving - but the feelings, the emotions happen whether we like them or not.
And it only by changing our thinking and our behaving that we can have some level of control over our emotions.
In my case there's a good chance the scary, or the fear is happening for two reasons:
My thinking is faulty
My behaviors are not helpful
First, my thinking is getting in the way because I'm listening to negative thoughts entering my brain.
For example - thoughts like:
You're not good enough
You're not a natural writer
You don't have the kind of dialogue that keep people hooked
You don't understand Internal Story Arcs well enough to add them appropriately to your story
And the thoughts go on and on
And if you spend too long on these thoughts - it can derail you. Because you either get stuck on them - and feel deflated - and stop writing. Or you continue to edit, and research ways to fix the problems you think you have.
Either way - it impacts your momentum.
And similarly, my behaviors can also get in the way. Based on my negative thoughts - if I give into them and start editing previous scenes, or researching better ways to do something - my behaviors decrease my momentum. Or, if I allow my thoughts to keep me from getting up early in the morning to write - it's those behaviors that start impacting my momentum.
But let's get back to the original issue - the direct connection between the negative thoughts - and my feelings of fear when faced with moving forward.
That's the real issue.
So how can we recognize when we start getting bombarded with these negative thoughts - and fight against them?
Push back against them and stick to our guns so we can keep making progress. Because at the end of the day - it's the first draft that most people never get finished.
If we can just keep moving forward and finish the first draft - we have passed a major road block. We've completed a very important milestone - one that can't be taken away from us.
Then - we can go back through and address specific things in draft 2, 3 and 4.
Maybe Draft 2 is all about continuity. And Draft 3 all about the Internal Story Arcs.
But that's for then - not for now.
So when those negative thoughts and feeling come our way - we need to send them packing.
Because they will only get in the way of our main goal - which is to finish the first draft.
// CHAPTER 3: NEW STUFF THAT HELPS SHAPE MY WRITING
I threw this chapter in because I thought it would be helpful to someone out there.
Almost like adding references at the bottom of the show notes.
So what have I found since our last episode that has helped me continue growing, and learning?
This time it happens to be a collaboration of a number of things - some of my favorite things:
First, is book one of the Harry Potter Series: The Sorcerer's Stone. by J.K. Rowling
I have never read Harry Potter books
Surprising, I know
I've watched the movies numerous times - but never read the books
So a few weeks ago I purchased the first book to give it a go
Second, is a new book being offered by The Story Grid:
Called: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone: A Story Grid Masterwork Analysis
By Savannah Gilbo & Abigail K. Perry
I have preordered it - and I'm looking forward to walking through it right after reading the book itself
And finally, there have been Story Grid YouTube Episodes discussing the book as well:
Introduction (Part 1 of a series of videos made based on the book): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Yka6dxh7aQ
A video discussing the Story Structure of the book:
This video is pretty amazing as it discusses the 4 Quadrants of book structure
What needs to be in each quadrant
Then shows how The Sorcerer's Stone fits into the quadrants
And also walks through the 5 Commandments of Storytelling within each quadrant
This type of thing can be extremely helpful for us writers. Because Harry Potter books are considered Master Works at this point. And if you can study them, and learn from them - you will only get better in your own writing.
So that's what I've been doing over the past week or so:
I've been reading the book itself
Watching the available YouTube videos
And waiting for the Master Work Analysis to ship here in the next few days
Once it arrives I can't wait to dig into that and learn more about the book and its structure
Let's Land the Plane:
Thanks for joining me yet again - for another installment of the Transcendent Trilogy.
I thought it would be fun to finish up with a quick AI Update:
I told you last time that I was using the Hemingway App to help me write
And that it runs on AI, but also allows you to apply Ai to specific things - like rewriting a sentence or paragraph. Changing the tone of a passage - things like that
And while I'm not a fan of those things yet - I obviously use AI all the time because the App itself is running everything you do through AI in order to provide the feedback on your use of words, sentences, grammar, etc.
Everything I write is marked up by the App and it's up to me if I fix the suggestions or not
But I've noticed some interesting things with this new version:
It can't make up it's mind sometimes...
It will highlight hadn't and suggest had not
Then the next minute the words had not are highlighted and it is recommending hadn't
That's going to get irritating right quick
Another thing I noticed is that it thinks it understands characters:
So one of my characters has a slight southern accent going on
And now the App is highlighting all sorts of words in dialogue and suggesting southern drawl replacements
For example - it will highlight knowing and suggest I replace it with knowin'
Or thought to and suggests fixin' to
Things like that
Pretty crazy if you ask me
So needless to say - the verdict is still out on the way AI is used in the Hemingway App
I love that it identifies things like hard sentences, and passive voice
To me that's priceless
But it's going to take some time to get used to the rest
And that's it for today my friends! Thanks again for being here - I hope all is well with you and your WIP.
With that - have a great week - and keep Transcending Human!