NANOPLANNING: STEP FIVE

     Step five is simple to explain, but a bit harder to do than any of the steps you've had so far...

• LOOK BACK at step two.... Now expand each of those sentences into more detail, making a paragraph out of each. Five sentences get fleshed out into five paragraphs.

     INNER CIRCLE:

     Step six is going to build on these five paragraphs, so don't put them off...

NANOPLANNING PART FOUR: Character summary

Today is step four of seven in our quest to prepare for Nanowrimo 2012. Today, we get a bit more inside the mind of some of our main characters. Use a sentence or two for each of the following six sections for each major character in your novel (or at least the two you did character profiles for):

Character snapshot: Briefly, who are these people? For example, in the new novel I'm working on, Arietta is a cross between Robin Hood and Joan of Arc. That should already put some of her qualities into your mind...

Motivation--why are the characters acting the way they are now, in the present? Backstory.

Goal--related to motivation, but bigger. What do these people want out of life? Future-oriented.

Conflict--What's the main problem that's preventing characters from getting what they want?

Epiphany--What are they going to learn? How will they grow and change?

Direction--where the character is generally headed in life.

INNER CIRCLE:

Look at the handout I'm giving you today to see a full character summary on Roxy Lee, a character in one of the novels I've written in the past. Keep in mind that instead of a Monday deadline, you're looking to have these ready for Friday, when we look at step five...

NANOPLANNING: PART THREE

     Today, we take a break from that little paragraph we wrote, and we begin to think about characters and backstory. Often, writers have much more "material" about a character than what ever shows up in their novel. Fleshing out characters helps them understand exactly what a character would or would not do in any given situation. In fact, once the characters are fully developed, THEY may begin "telling" the writer what to do. Minor characters may take over and become THE major characters if they become interesting enough.
    
     Imagine keeping a file on or interviewing your character--you'll know what they look like, of course, and their name, but you'll need to dig deeper too. Find out all the pertinent facts. Does being the eldest or youngest in the family affect them? Do they have a nuclear family? A dysfunctional one? Do they come from the richest of neighbourhoods or are they dirt poor?

     Here's an example of a "character profile" template found online that can help you get to know your characters more.  You can find more by Googling those words in quotation marks too. Fill one out for AT LEAST your main protagonist and main antagonist:

http://www.suspense.net/profile.htm

INNER CIRCLE:

I'm giving you handouts to complete this step with, but of course you can add sections that you think will be more useful to your characters. What I give you is just enough to get you going...

NANO PLANNING PART TWO

So you have your single sentence to describe your novel? (See, Tiam? I started a sentence with "So...")

Part two involves E X P A N D I N G that sentence into a small paragraph (which will end up sounding a bit like a back cover blurb):

Sentence #1 Story setup / backdrop

Sentence #2 Conflict / disaster #1

Sentence #3 Conflict / disaster #2

Sentence #4 Conflict / disaster #3

Sentence #5 A HINT of the ending or resolution--don't give anything away...

Keep in mind that this is a GUIDELINE, and I won't be counting sentences, or anything like that. Just be sure to have the five parts covered:

Blake Mack is a thief who, while fleeing police, veers off onto a logging road and slams into a cyclist, whose identity he assumes. he enjoys his new start at first, but then a young hotshot police officer with something to prove starts making his life more difficult. To make matters worse, he discovers a shocking secret about the true identity of the man he has become. when a new love interest betrays him, he has no one to turn to. He's on the run--from the law, from "The Company," and from a broken relationship; his only way out may be to start all over again...will he get the chance?

NANO PLANNING: STEP ONE

Can you believe it--Nanowrimo is just one short month away! It's time to start planning...and to do that, let's start small...with a single sentence:

STEP ONE (of SEVEN)

     We start with your dream--seeing your novel on the New York Times bestseller list! If it was there, you would see a one-sentence description of it, like some of the ones from today's list:

1

WINTER OF THE WORLD, by Ken Follett. (Dutton, $36.) In Book 2 of the Century trilogy, members of five interrelated families from five countries, some of them children of characters in the previous book, “Fall of Giants,” grapple with the tumultuous historical events of the years 1939-49.

2

1

A WANTED MAN, by Lee Child. (Delacorte, $28.) A carload of people involved in a conspiracy pick up a disheveled hitchhiker, Child’s vigilante hero Jack Reacher.

3

2

GONE GIRL, by Gillian Flynn. (Crown, $25.) A woman disappears on her fifth anniversary; is her husband a killer?

4

3

THE TIME KEEPER, by Mitch Albom. (Hyperion, $24.99.) A fable about the inventor of the world’s first clock, who returns to our world after centuries of banishment; from the author of “Tuesdays With Morrie.”

LOW PRESSURE, by Sandra Brown. (Grand Central, $26.99.) A woman makes disturbing discoveries — and acquires a stalker — when she writes a book about her sister’s murder.   INNER CIRCLE: You have two days (although I know most of you will finish it today) to write the one-sentence description of the bestseller you are about to write in November, 2012. Step two on Wednesday!