Thursday, October 13, 2011

Writing a novel involves more than inspiration and putting words on paper.  It's important to take a few minutes to organize the backbone of the book - the chapters.

I use a spreadsheet program for this task.  I create the following headings:

Chapter Number, Chapter Name, Projected Word Count, Actual Word Count and Purpose of Chapter

I intend to write the full 50,000 words (maybe more), so I create 20 chapters (one per row in the spreadsheet) and give each one a working title (which is subject to change as the book evolves).  The projected word count is 2,500 (which will change when I actually start writing).  As I write the book, I enter the actual word count and calculate the difference from 50,000 so I know how many words remain to be written as I pursue my word-count goal.  Under the heading "Purpose of Chapter", I enter a few short sentences to explain the purpose of each chapter, the names of the characters in it, why they are important to the scene, and the actions that should result from that chapter so the story can move logically to the next one.