Story Writing (The Hard Part)

The main character Long from my book "Green Success" ...although he never says "believe it!" in the story, this picture was meant to be funny, as I didn't want my book to be 100% serious.... if you don't get the joke go watch the first episode of Naruto...

OVERVIEW: Every writer has their own secret formula for writing their book, the formula revolves around actions, and events that trigger emotions from the reader and things that make the reader feel for the book. An example of an actual formula used in a story: Character meets the other main Characters, a Comical beginning, A serious middle part, A comical and funny closing, a disastrous and sad ending. This was an actual formula a writer used for their anime series, it was their own formula and many writers fail to create their own as well. If you can create your own formula it will be easier to stick to a path to follow and easier to make a more enjoyable book...



I planned out exactly what I wanted to write about and I visualized the scene in my head, but I never had it quite 100% visable, but after I start writing, then I can slowly see the skeleton I am assembling and then later I can go back and put on the skin and what not. So the main idea I'm trying to get across is that you should never think of your first draft as your final draft... at least not if you take your book seriously...

SPLITTING UP THE STORY

Just like a song is split into different segments, some often being repeated, I think a book should be split up as well. Beginning, Middle and End. The Beginning of the story was devoted to introducing the characters, settings, and conflict all while trying to gain the readers interest in the rest of the book. The Beginning part should give the reader all the necessary information to be able to understand the rest of the book, for example if you're writing about dragons it would be wise to mention dragons somewhere in the beginning part of the story. The Beginning is by far one of the most important parts, and needs to be worked on hard and made as good as possible, nothing kills an audience more than a boring into. The Middle is the sequence of events that happen as a result of this conflict, and also shows the characters methods of going about to resolve this conflict. Usually the middle part is the longest part and should be full of different events. The End part obviously resolves the conflict, but should also slow down the pace of the story as it makes its slow gradual tug towards the conclusion of the story....

WRITING

So After I understood this I began with writing the Introduction of my story, I believe I already covered that in my last post, so I'll skip that and move on to the end of the intro and the beginning of the middle part.

After I created memorable and unique characters that come alive on the page and make actions that make them more memorable and alive than any fictional character, I needed to introduce them, which I talk about in the previous post. After I had introduced the five main characters (there was still one left, she pops ion the story later) I had finished introducing the setting clearly from the school grounds to the house streets, (I did this as these were parts of the events, I didn't just make separate paragraphs dedicated to describing these things, because I felt it would slow down the story. So I described the setting during the times that the characters and events took place on these places.) Your setting is important, don't just pick some random setting, you setting needs to be so important that if the setting were somewhere else, it would be an entirely different story. I knew everything was taken care of, so I finished my beginning part with a "Bridge" if you will. NO, More like a "ramp", I wanted the reader to feel like they have read to a point in the story where they can put down the book and rest, and pick it up later. But I also created a "ramp" or "Slide" Which they had slid down part way as they finished the beginning part. The only way they could fully slide down this "slide" and reach the water for the big splash was to continue reading. I hope my analogy makes sense. Basically I made it clear that there would be a seperation between the parts, while still making sure the reader will be interested.

Now I will admit I did feel a little limited as to what was going on in the Beginning part, I limited my self to not overwhelming the story with so much events or information, but only what was necessary for the reader to be able to understand the rest of the story. I added lot's of comical [arts in the beginning to, parts that when I was writing them down they actually made me Laugh Out Loud. I also added some sad and emotional parts in the beginning to so the reader could feel more into the book, experience it for them selves and not feel like their being hand fed all the information.

THE FUN PART

The Middle part was by far the most fun I ever had in writing. Because of the story line of my book I could basically write about ANYTHING, literally ANYTHING, I could write about space ships and dragons and still the book would make sense because of the story line I chose for the book, (Which will be revealed upon release) ..And yes I did add a part with a Dragon in the book, even though it takes place in modern times and has no magic powers what so ever, it still makes sense and it's by far my favorite part of the book! Very imaginative.

Basically I could whip up any situation and throw the characters in, knowing this, as for any story, The events had to be unique and relevant to the story. I spent most of my time sitting in front of the computer screen listening to music and thinking of the events, I re-thought about the events multiple times, sometimes I didn't write anything down for days, I spent so much time day dreaming and changing up the event little by little. It was great and it felt good to know how creative I was getting!

When ever you get an idea write it down as soon as possible, it is better to write down your fresh ideas now, often during school while I was still writing it, I day dreamed about what was going to happen next, but due to my lazy habit of not writing anything down I often forgot when I got home, so I decided to only think about it in front of the computer screen, or keep notes at school. What a logical solution huh?

This is a picture of on of my desks, I do most of my drawings on this one, and what looks like a child's play time paradise is actually a place where lot's of work gets done! Obviously I have to clear a space for me every time I need to use it, most of the time I'm using this desk by simply looking at the objects on tip of it.

Basically let your mind run free, and let other things in, always have distractions in your work place. My whole desk is cluttered with distractions and it's a good thing! The room never looks the same and there's always variety and inspirational things laying around. When writing about a sad part, the logical thing would be to listen to sad music right? Then re read it over without the sad music and see how it makes you feel, remember the reader probably isn't listening to the same music as you when they read your story... if they listen to music while they read.... Take breaks often and don't be afraid to watch anime and your favorite shows... I often watched anime that touched upon the same subjects or similar subjects as my book. If I wanted to develop a character more I first watched an anime and studies how it developed its characters then I would learn from it and try to do the same.... while not stealing anything or copying it.... Remember to be completely original....

This is my main desk with my main computer, ( I have four other ones for different purposes, I got the other four for free, this is the only one I actually paid for) Ass you can see there are lot's of things on this desk, you could almost consider it a clearance shelf at the store.I often feel like a child siting here, but hey my childhood was full of imagination. I have things ranging from PSP's to Hand drawn frames I used for animations. The two yellow sticky notes have algorithms for solving a Rubik's cube, just in case I forget. I often stop working just to take a look at these objects again, and usually I get lot's of designs and settings from looking at the placement of the objects and imagining town and houses and different countries all on my one desk..... it would be a shame if my house burnt down.....

Another bad habit I often found my self doing, and what I'm doing right now as I type this sentence. I often stayed up late at night writing. The brain works best when it's awake, but I though to my self, late at night when I'm supposed to be dreaming, isn't that the best time to get creative? The answer is yes! (For me that is) I have found I am most willing to work at night... not as much distractions, not as much other things to do besides work.... but during the day I have found my writings to be much better... I guess it's a trade off, write creatively but poorly during the night, then get some good sleep and during the day after I convince my self to get to work ( if I can) then I'll edit the writings I've done during the night.

This is just the wall above one of my desks, I just thought it might be interesting to look at... I have things up on the wall from when I was in 6th grade all the way to recently I've posted pictures of favorite anime series such as Air and Death Note... can't forget about Legend Of Zelda in the left corner....

This was how I wrote my story, but your ways may differ. Always try new things, accept others ideas and plans, Ignorance is the source of all stupidity....

Okay so I've written this long and "boring" post, time to get some juicy stuff. I hate writing about my self because I feel kind of selfish doing so and I also hate those types of blogs, you know all those "bloggers" on YouTube who sit in front of the camera and talk all about themselves..... but I guess some of you might have something to benefit from it.

I started to write my story in my free time. It was a very interesting practice. You see on top of School work I often had to write short stories for La HonorsII and when you compared my short stories to my other class mates, there's really no comparison. Now I'm not sure if they were just those loser school kids who don't put any effort in their homework because they don't care or because they really did suck at writing. What ever the case this made me feel like a good writer. Because of this I often based my short stories off of the Novel I was working on, then I would also just transfer some of the passages into my actual novel. This was a start, and I kept going at it until I dropped LA Honors II because of some crazy project that was too much to handle....

....I began writing late at night because that's when I"m most willing to work, no distractions and stuff, but I needed distractions to be most creative, whatever the case I think I still was able to write good. I often became very sleepy at school because of this and I often fell a sleep during 5th and 6th period, or at lease I wanted to. I have to walk home from school, and a lot of the events and things that happen in my book happen while the characters walk home.... and no it is actually entertaining, it's not boring at all.... because I walked home I would feel even more sleepy! I sometimes fell asleep in my room and would find my self awake at around 5:00 with no homework done yet and a dozen dogs sleeping beside me. My parents and siblings didn't get home til around 7:00 which was why the character "Andrew" in my book had no parents but rather an uncle who was in charge of the land, eventually he kicks Andrew off the land.....

I would often begin each chapter with a small scene of nature and vast imagery so to get my self warmed up. I didn't realize till late into the story that all these scenes of nature actually played an important role in the understanding of the story and also how it relates to the title of the book "Green Success" Now the title seems like a weird title, but it actually fits well with the story if you read it. I'll talk about how I chose my Title later in a shorter post.

I think writing is one of the easiest careers because basically all you do is sit down and think, write when you need to, but most of your time is spent thinking and planning imaginary events and imaginary characters... a very fun career in deed..... and not to mention my work place is my house.... This is a post on writing a book alone... as I wrote my first book alone in my room..... there were lot's if fun things yes, airsoft guns and Wii and other things to do in my room.... I never found my self working on my book while other people were in the room...

...but get a life, go out side, hang out with friends, even if you want to make writing a career, you need to get out and have a variety in your life.... if you just focus on one thing, eventually that one thing will become stale.... trying new things,. taking breaks... the human body wasn't meant to work all day long, all the time...

...Don't think of me as some super writer, because I'm not, I have terrible diction and grammar usage, even when I talk I don't use big words much.... I think I could use improvement,. but I"m not going to focus just on my writing, but rather, what I"m writing about and how I write about it.... It's not how good you draw, but what you draw...

This is the beginning of the sixth chapter of my book, how I use imagery to set up the scene:

The sun spread out its glowing arms and hugged the sky tightly as it seemed to be slipping off the edge of the world, it's rays infected in the sky a vivid orange. The grass was flooded by the sun, and the bushes reflected its glow. The streets were washed with gold and the heat torched the passing cars as their windows reflected the bright blaze. The pavement was shady as the roof protected it from the sun's down pour of orange, and the door swung wide open as Long stepped inside.




...another thing I failed to mention is the key elements that make up a story, the most important one is the motif. A motif is a reoccurring element or item that stands or symbolizes something bigger, for example in my story the school lunch bell always rings and it seems like the bell rings way to early, this symbolizes how little time we actually have to live our lives and do our things.... A motif of something say Death Note, would probably be Death or The Shinigami.... the Shinigami could possibly represent temptation as it was because of them that the humans used the Death Notes.... but those are just guesses....


Now pay attention if you didn't pay attention to the previous paragraphs at least read this one because it is important! You need to understand the theme of your story. The theme is a lesson or moral, but in fiction the theme is never "preached" or mentioned directly, instead it is learned through the characters action, events and outcomes. In order to make a memorable and meaningful book the writer needs to be able to communicate a theme between the reader well, and it can be complicated or it could be simple. An example of a theme statement is: Never do something unprepared. And then you would write a story about something like how a traveler went empty handed on a journey and failed miserably.... but that's just a lame example... I'm sure you can create a much better theme and story than that, and your book can have multiple themes if you want, but there has to be a clear cut main theme, otherwise the book may feel like it's just bouncing all over the place.... So thank everyone who reads this I really hope you do benefit from this! I know I want to be a writer, but I don't want to be the only one helping my self up.. that would be terribly selfish.... so I want to reach out to others who have the potential to contribute to this society....


- Andrew T.