How to Write Emotional Scenes in a Novel

As we are in the writing stage of the novel using the free novel writing software of yWriter5, I found an article today which I think offers great value in regards to writing tips. The blog, Tell me a Story by Anthony James Barnett has a post titled: The Fulfilling Facet - Emotional Influence.

He gives the reader, presumably also a writer, tips on how to write emotion into the novels. Personally, I find it difficult to generate the right amount of emotion to balance with the descriptive parts. We need drama without being melodramatic and the advice he offers is sound and makes sense. (Why didn't I think of it?)

Anyway, be sure to return to this page and tell me what you think of the post.

Happy writing.

Plan/Plot Your Novel with yWriter5

So you have downloaded the yWriter5 program as discussed in the previous post, installed it on your computer and now you are ready to start using it. First of all you need to create a new project. Click on the project tab on the left and select New Project Wizard from the drop down menu.

Fill in all the details required by the wizard and return to the main screen. Now you need to add a short summary of your novel (think of the book blurb on the back of a novel) to the project notes so you keep your writing focused and on track. On the main screen at the right hand side you will notice the tab "Project Notes". Click on the tab and select "New".

 Save the note you made there and click on the "Chapter" tab on top and select "Create Multiple Chapters" from the drop-down menu. A screen will pop-up asking how many chapters you want to create. Enter the amount and the chapters will be created in the left side pane of the view.

Next you want to create a number of empty scenes for each chapter. Click on the "Scenes" tab on the top and select "Create multiple scenes". Insert the number of scenes you want to add per chapter and repeat for each chapter. You can always add more scenes or delete scenes later.

Click on the "Project" tab on top and select "Project Settings" from the drop- down menu. In the pop-up box , enter the name of your project in the Project tab and if you wish, enter a short description of the project/book there. Move to the next tab and inset the author name. In the "Deadlines" tab you can enter the dates you want to finish with each part of the novel writing process.

 This is important if you have a deadline to submit the novel to an editor (I wish) or a publisher. Next from the "Tools" tab on top, select "Daily Word Count Target" and fill in the amount of words you want to write, in other words the length of your novel and when you want to start and when you want to complete the first draft. The yWriter program will then calculate how many words you have to write per day to stay on target.

Now that you know how many words you have to write per day, you can start planning your novel. This you can do in various ways. You can first create your characters in the characters tab and add detail to each character or you can start planning the chapters (the story) and add the character detail as you write the draft. Having the details of the characters listed under the character tab helps you later in the novel to avoid inconsistencies in appearance, character traits, etc. The same reasoning applies to the locations tab and the locations where your novel takes place.

Write a short description for each chapter. What is the purpose of the chapter? Think of ten or fifteen questions you want answered in the chapter and formulate that into scene descriptions. In the long descriptions write three or more keywords to remind you what you wanted in the scene.

Once the outline is done, you can begin to actually write the novel by clicking on the scene and entering the text into the text box. This I will deal with in the next post.

All the images above can be expanded to view a larger image in a new tab.

How to Get Ideas for a Novel

All stories start with an idea. Ideas are easy to find - just look around you and take notice of the environment, but mostly the people. Peculiar habits of friends, family and strangers often spark an idea for a character in a novel or short story. A family member or friend who reacts predictably to his or her environment affords the writer a wealth of information upon which a character can be build. Take notice of the manner in which people talk and gesture. In short - pay attention to others and the ideas for a new character will flow.

Characters are not enough to build a story on. You also need a plot or story line. In other words, what is the story about? You need to be able to summarize in one sentence what the central theme of the story would be. If someone reads the story, he or she must be able to identify the central theme. A romance novel's theme would for example be "friendship grows into love" or "helping someone in need leads to love". This central idea is the 'premise' of the story.

Most people think finding an original premise is an impossible task to accomplish, as there are thousands of romance novels, mysteries and science fiction books for sale. Even if your idea involves the classic romance between teenage sweethearts who grew apart over the years only to find each other later in life, it would still be your own unique characters with their own personality doing the romancing. Your characters will develop the story in their own way and if you stay true to the personality you gave the character, there will be no duplication of another novel.

Once you have the idea or premise of the story, you can begin to develop characters for the story and plot an outline of how the story will develop. Some people do not create an outline for a novel and choose to write and see where the story takes them in their imagination. Although this works for some, you may easily find yourself, after having written a couple of thousand words, in a corner and not knowing how to proceed with the story. The internet contains several free downloadable software packages to assist in planning the outline of the novel as well as writing the actual story - yWriter4 is a free program and can be of value to a novice writer.

Above all, read as many books on the subject of writing as you possibly can and visit free online forums for tips and ideas.