My second post in the Writing Camp series is here!
I am going to link to the full outline of the book at the bottom of the post because I don't want to share that on the blog and spoil the story for people who may want to read it :)
I took some time after watching the first video to think about what story I would like to tell.
I am going to work through the steps outlined in the video, and as I currently have no idea what I want to write about I think it will be a really interesting project!
Step One:
I made notes as I was watching the Writing Camp video, and the first thing I had put under step one is write out your ideas so that is what I am going to do here.
The main points that were highlighted are characters, timelines, and scenes.
It can be a bit difficult for me to stay on track when I get into something (as you may have noticed if you read my first post…) so I have taken a look at the titles of the other modules to try to decide what to focus on and how much detail I should get into.
I tend to end up crafting my characters in quite a lot of detail to start out with, and then finding a plot that works for them. It is really difficult not to do that now, because the next module on the course is about designing characters and I don’t want to jump the gun.
I initially had a couple of different ideas for the story I want to plan in this course, but I knew that I wanted to write another book with werewolves, and so I started by coming up with a few different ideas for that. I know it’s cliched, but it’s what I am good at and I have so many ideas that tie in with my original book that I am really looking forward to exploring. Step One suggests writing down my ideas with characters, timelines, and scenes. I decided to do that and then I picked the idea I liked the most to use for the full outline: - A sequel to Morrigan which would be set ten-fifteen years after the end of the first book. This would be a longer novel - Morrigan is currently 147k words long, and will be about 250k when it is finished. The sequel would be a similar length. - A prequel to Centuries which is a love story about a human and a wolf. This ends with the human being sent away to have her half-wolf child (Elizabeth from Centuries) in secret. This would be about 75k words long. -A prequel to Centuries about Francesca - this is something I had already started, but I abandoned the project because it didn’t have a very solid plotline and I was struggling with what direction it should take. Now that I have a better idea of her past, I could use the writing camp to finalize that and pick the project up again. This would be about 150k words long. - A book which covers the main event that started off everything in Centuries. I know what this is, and have talked about it in the book. This would be an action heavy novel without the scope for romance which is what I am better at writing so although the plot is there and it’s solid, I don’t think I would do a good job of writing it unless I spend time working on the main characters in advance. I have no idea how long that would end up. - Something crazy and opulent set while the dynasty founded in Morrigan which ends in Centuries are at the height of their power. This would be really fun, and there are loads of different eras and characters I could write about if I did this. I think I might struggle to pin something down, and this would end up being a longer book - 250k words or so -Something set after Centuries which may have some of the same characters but may not. I am hesitant to do this because I think it would suck for my readers to find out what happens to my characters before the main series is actually over. Maybe 150k? I don’t think I want to do this, but I may keep the idea in the pipeline for some time in the future! I am going to use the Centuries prequel for the rest of the Writing Camp because I think that would be a really nice project to work on and the story would be a sweet little stand-alone that I think my regular readers will appreciate. Step Two: The most important thing I had noted for Step Two is draw the plot using the ideas The information Elizabeth has about her mother, Marlene’s, relationship with her biological father, Daniel, is all second hand, and it is not very reliable. She is initially hurt and angry, feeling particularly resentful that her parents took away her chance at connecting with the wolf part of her. She knows that it was a summer fling, and she initially believes her father took advantage of her mother until her mother dies and she find a picture of her mother with a large wolf which convinces her that they were happy during their brief time together and that they would probably have remained together if that was possible. 1. How do Marlene and Daniel meet? They meet at some point during the summer. Marlene is 19, and preparing to study neuro-science at Leipzig university (Germany) - this has already been established in Centuries. Daniel is preparing to take over as Alpha from his father. He is living in the city because he wants to get away from the responsibilities he is about to take on, and he is actively looking for a casual fling with someone - he is drawn to Marlene because she is young, carefree, and as she is new to the city and has a poor relationship with her parents, he is confident that he would be able to kill her without it causing any trouble if she found out the truth about him. They meet in a bar, and their relationship is immediately intense and passionate. 2. What are the pivotal moments of the story? This story has a lot of scope for minor plot points and exciting twists, but for the initial outline I think the main pivotal moments would be: - Daniel realizing he loves Marlene, and revealing the truth about who he is. - Marlene accepting that their relationship can only be temporary, even though she has not felt happiness like this before - Daniel revealing his wolf-form to Marlene - Daniel realizing that Marlene is pregnant, which she is not yet aware of herself, and accepting that he is not going to be able to kill her - Daniel tells Marlene she is pregnant, and when she gets over the initial shock they talk about what they will do. They have to accept that they can’t be together, but Daniel offers Marlene a chance to raise her child in another country (Alberta, Canada) with enough money to complete her neuro-science degree and to care for their child for the first few years, while giving up any chance of seeing each other again. Step Three: I actually think this is well fleshed out already, but I am going to do a proper outline because I am really excited about this story already and I think there are loads of interesting things I should include, The notes I had written for Step Three are: Add scenes, supporting characters, and logic Add details to make the character’s motivations and behaviour more logical Determine the characters who will be presented on the scene Organize the outline by time This is the step you can unleash your imagination The result will be the final, revised outline A lot of the main points above have already been covered, but I want to think about all of these things because I know that some of them are going to be really important but might be a little difficult in this story. The biggest issue I can think of is adding supporting characters, because this is essentially a story about forbidden love, and it will be difficult to have any characters who are werewolves other than Daniel. It is also quite important that Marlene is a fairly isolated person who has not made many friends in the city yet, because that is what Daniel initially finds appealing about perusing her beyond a one-night-stand. To get around this, I am going to have Marlene, a 19-year-old student, living in a student house with other young women. I think that it would be interesting to have them talk to her about Daniel and what they think of him. As first-year medical students she may face criticism from one of her housemates for wasting time on a guy. She might confide in someone in a moment of weakness after Daniel realizes she is pregnant but before he tells her - he has just broken her heart, and she turns to a friend for help. She might have a male housemate, or a fellow student, who is a love rival. I like the idea of her childhood sweetheart showing up at her new home with a bunch of flowers and expecting her to be completely enamoured with him, only to find she is now in this wild, fiery relationship with an exciting, (slightly) older guy who totally blows this small-town boy out of the water. I’d like a character named Elizabeth so that readers of Centuries see who she was named after. I think this would be a good chance for some drama - the original Elizabeth could end up dead at the hands of a werewolf showing Marlene the danger of the man she is with. The timeline is going to be fairly compact - this is a whirlwind summer romance. Marlene and Daniel meet, and 8 weeks later she is sent to live in Canada. If I broke the chapters down day by day it would be 56 chapters long, so I think that could be a cool idea for this. To reach my 75k target this way it would be about 1350 words per chapter, which I think would be perfect. For my final outline I will break it down into the 8 week blocks (so each portion of the outline will be broken down into 7 episodes) To see the full outline, broken down by chapter, please read my official Writing Camp post.
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