Writing a Book Outline
Writing a Great Book Outline and Writing to Target I have recently finished my debut novel so don’t consider myself an expert on this but I was greatly helped by using a system for writing the book. This system kept me to time and was just what I needed. The system I used I have adapted from one I learned from a course on Udemy called Reverse Engineer Riveting Fiction The first thing I need to say is that I did veer off but not hugely and you will see what I mean when I explain it. Storyline Obviously before you can develop a plan there needs to be a story in your head. My story evolved but I had the basics of the plot before I started writing. I had a main character (initially it was 2), sub-characters important to the plot, a scene (set on a cruise ship), a theme – murder mystery (initially thriller but turned out to be cosy as I don’t do graphic), a beginning, a middle and an end (I had two in mind). Word Count The next thing was to decide on a rough word count. There is some debate over words needed but in general they are as follows: Word Counts are not written in stone Depending on what you read there are different opinions on how long a book should be so I have gathered a few together but they are just guides. Publishers will have minimum and maximum word counts for different books and generally frown on shorter novels and those that are too long. Novel 40,000 words or over (generally 60,000 for mystery, 90,000+ for non-series novel). Some authors and publishers recommend 50,000+ with a maximum of 120,000 but Harry Potter and the order of the Phoenix is over 250,000 words!Young…