I Started Writing a New Novel!

I started writing a new book today (or maybe two)! Before writing, I spent a couple of weeks trying to sketch out the plot. I find it really hard to revise a story later if I haven’t thought enough about the plot before I start, because sometimes it seems that when I change anything, the whole story unravels. So, I decided to do more thinking before I leapt into writing. What I did:

1. Brainstormed.

2. Shaped the ideas into a long summary of the story and gave it to two very critical kids in my target age group to pick apart. Revised based on their feedback.

3. Wrote some brief descriptions of main characters and the setting.

4. Used the “nine box” technique to help organize some main plot points (for more info see Suzette Saxton's Feb post at QueryTracker).

5. Wrote a one-sentence summary. (Thanks, Christy, for your suggestion over on MiG Writers).

I have two great ideas for separate novels that have kept popping into my mind from time to time, and I didn’t know which to choose first. So I followed this process for both of them. Still don’t know which one to choose -- I’m working on both. I expect soon one will take over. Today I started writing Novel A.

I don't usually write novels this fast, back-to-back, but I figure I'll be on a break from teaching in the summer, so I can do revisions then.