So you’re planning your first novel, and suddenly it seems like you’ve chewed all the sugar out of the gum. You felt so excited about this novel, but after taking several shots at the opening scenes, the whole thing seems to have run out of steam. What do you do?
Bailee posted this question on my “Ask A Question For My Blog” page:
I think I have a story that I want to write. This would be my first time writing a book, and I’m at a pretty big loss for words. I find myself wrestling with multiple opening chapters and losing steam when trying to plan it out. It’s unbelievably frustrating to me. Would you say its best to dive right into a novel or should I have a solid outline before beginning?
Randy sez: There are a couple of possible reasons that I can think of for why your novel is losing steam, Bailee. I can’t tell which is the reason, so I’ll cover them both and hope that one of them rings a bell for you.
You might be losing steam because:
- You’ve gotten stuck on rewriting the first few scenes over and over again.
- You’ve tried to plan out your whole novel, when your brain isn’t wired that way.
Let’s look at those two possibilities in more depth.
Revision Hell
Writer sometimes talk about “revision hell”—a bad place where you can get stuck forever.
Note that there is also a “revision heaven” where you put the pot on simmer for a good long time and keep doing revisions over and over while the story turns into soup. I’ve done that for a project that needed it, and I didn’t mind it a bit, because I thought it made the story better.
You can tell whether you’re in revision heaven or revision hell by asking whether the story is getting better. (And also, whether you’re enjoying it.)
Bailee, it’s possible you’re in revision hell. New writers often get caught in revision hell by writing a few scenes, then getting them critiqued, then rewriting the scenes, then getting them critiqued again, and doing that over and over forever.
That way lies eternal torment. That road guarantees to make your novel lose steam.
If you’re in revision hell, then here’s how to escape. Write your scenes and take them in for critique, but then leave the scenes alone while you write the next scenes in your novel, applying what you just learned from the critique to the new scenes. Promise yourself not to revise any scenes until you finish the first draft of the novel.
When you do this, you make forward progress in your story, and you become a better writer, both at the same time. And your novel doesn’t lose steam.
Planning for Pantsers
Some writers just naturally write by the seat of their pants, without any kind of outline or character preparation. We call these writers “seat-of-the-pants” writers (SOTPs for short), or sometimes just “pantsers.” Their brains are wired to write without planning. Many, many great novelists write this way. If that’s the way your brain is wired, then write that way.
Other writers just naturally need to plan out the story before they write it. Knowing where they’re going gives them the feeling of security they need in order to write the next scene, and the next, and the next. Many, many great novelists write this way. If that’s the way your brain is wired, then write that way. My wildly popular Snowflake Method is one variation on this theme, but there are others.
But what happens if a pantser tries to plan their novel?
Bad things happen. I’ve seen it numerous times.
The pantser will quickly get bored trying to plan their novel. They feel like the story isn’t fun anymore. And they’re right. Planning isn’t fun for pantsers. Planning is loads of fun for planners.
Bailee, it’s possible you’re a pantser trying to be a planner. That will take the steam out of your novel every time.
If that’s the case, then the solution is simple. Stop planning and just type the novel.
Here’s one indicator that can help you decide if you’re a planner or a pantser. Imagine that some authority figure tells you: “Throw away all your plans and just type the novel.”
How do you feel when you hear those words?
- If that feels liberating to you, then you’re probably a pantser.
- If that feels terrifying to you, then you’re probably a planner.
Other Possible Causes
There are probably other possible reasons why Bailee might be losing steam. I can’t think of any right now, but I’m sure my Loyal Blog Readers can. If you’ve got some ideas on what’s causing Bailee’s problem, leave a comment here.
Writing fiction should be fun. If it’s not fun, then something’s wrong.
Got a Question for My Blog?
If you’ve got a question you’d like me to answer in public on this blog, hop on over to my “Ask A Question For My Blog” page and submit your question. I’ll answer the ones I can, but no guarantees. There are only so many hours in the day.
I feel like I’m between a pantser and a planner.I NEED the planning process because it helps me organize and understand the story, and also develop it, because my ideas come slowly. A story is like a 10k piece puzzle to me, and you can’t solve it without spending a good portion of your time analyzing it.
But the freedom to just sit and write is also liberating, because it leads me to great ideas I wouldn’t have unless I had already started writing, since the process of writing helps me to understand my story better.
My main problem is: If I don’t plan I get stuck in the beggining with no where to go and a very limited point of view, since I don’t spend a lot of time trying to solve the puzzle that is my story. But if I do plan, I also get stuck without ideas because I don’t fully understand my story yet. And I never even start my story.
Trying to do both at the same time is like trying to clean some dust in the middle of a hurricane. It’s chaotic. And torture. But it’s also the only way I actually move on with my story.
I am in this boat right now. This is not my first novel but it’s the first “type” of this genre (I normally write romance and this is a contemporary fiction). I am down to the last two chapters and until the last little bit everything was flowing wonderfully. I am a planner and have my outline very carefully written out. But now it’s like my writing has turned blah an bland, I’m having trouble getting the scenes to come out the way I want. It’s so upsetting since the finish line is so close. My plan is to just keep going so I can get the basic idea down at least, then let the rough draft stew for a bit before going back and hopefully making it right. It is very frustrating though!
This was a helpful article. I’m somewhere between planner and pantser too. Generally I start with one little seed of an idea, begin building a story in my head around it, and then I write down everything I got in paragraph format the same way you might tell someone about a movie you just saw. Then I begin writing. Having down the basic idea of what I want in my story helps me to know where I want to go, and then I know what I want to include. But at the same time, some of the best things I’ve ever written have been done by the seat-of-my-pants. I also find that having a rough idea of where I’m going helps me see where that idea doesn’t work, like if some part of the plot doesn’t make logical sense.
Often my story changes quite a lot from the plan, which is okay. I like having notes that remind me of plot elements I really liked because writing a novel can take a long time, especially for me because I always have MANY cooking at the same time.
On a side note, I don’t really have anyone who will read and re-read my writing for me. I get one reading, if I’m lucky, from any of my critics. But I do get stuck in another sort of “revision purgatory”? That’s when I feel uninspired or stuck on whatever I’m working on so I go back and re-read/revise my own work. I can do this for days and days or even weeks, just writing a paragraph here and a sentence there. I’d call it purgatory because I enjoy it and hate it all at once since I want to move on, but feel I can’t. I think revising is very important, but when I’m stuck I can way overdo it.
Second, you won’t have to worry about how each chapter ends or how it transitions into the next chapter. You can just write each complete scene and move onto the next scene, and then the next scene until you’re finished.
Then, when it’s time to break your story into chapters, you can make sure the chapter breaks fall at the most exciting
! That’s what I’ve been doing trying to end it at “good spot” making it hook. Trying to make every damn chapter as well made as first chapters often are.
Here’s the only thing you need to know about chapter endings: they must contain a hook. There are hooks all over the place in a good story. Every scene should introduce new elements and raise new questions that draw readers deeper and deeper into the web you’re weaving.
As with all hooks, the essence here is a question. We need to pique reader curiosity and make them want to read on to find out what’s gonna happen.
This absolutely does not mean that every chapter should end with a cliffhanger, especially a “false” cliffhanger in which you lead readers to fear an outcome at the end of the chapter, only to have them turn the page to a “Whoops, gotcha! Don’t worry the protagonist is really fine.” (hate)
Even so, for the sake of variety, it’s worthwhile to explore other options. Here’s one I recommend you try: stakes of access.
As a consequence of failure, the protagonist will lose access to a place or person that he greatly values. In a variation of these stakes, the protagonist will lose the opportunity to regainaccess to something that he values.
Your job is to plant question upon layered question and release the answers, measured, over the course of the book.
End each chapter early. If there isn’t a tiny what the hell? at the end of your chapter, re-write it so there is. Build your chapter to crescendo, then cut it. This is hard to do. The main character opens the door, but we don’t see what’s on the other side. The gun goes off, but we don’t know if anyone was hit.
For example, if your protagonist is trying to escape from a burning building, all of the escape routes should be blocked. Keep increasing your narrative obstacles to the point that your reader sees no possible way out.
What/ who is going to stand in their way? (this could be themselves, like religious belief, or fear of failure, or another character, or situation etc)
——- This is why I almost always end my chapters with the disaster part of the scene. End this chapter on something awful happening. —–
Put your best characters in a room together. Meryn, Parcival, Han, and Opial. Make them talk to each other. AH! After the monk scene they go back to Opial and ask for help with her energy and near dying problem. Parcival says that there’s a rare recipe for giving long energy and healing at (town/city). so they travel there with Opil as this town is in a town of Mages that only she can enter. :3
Make readers care:
Put your character in a hard situation that your reader can relate to.
Show your character responding to that hard situation in a way that gives the reader hope.
Once you’ve done that, your reader will care about your character. And the reader will even care about your character’s backstory.
You might be losing steam because:
You’ve gotten stuck on rewriting the first few scenes over and over again.
You’ve tried to plan out your whole novel, when your brain isn’t wired that way.
You can tell whether you’re in revision heaven or revision hell by asking whether the story is getting better. (And also, whether you’re enjoying it.)
Bailee, it’s possible you’re in revision hell. New writers often get caught in revision hell by writing a few scenes, then getting them critiqued, then rewriting the scenes, then getting them critiqued again, and doing that over and over forever.
If you’re in revision hell, then here’s how to escape. Write your scenes and take them in for critique, but then leave the scenes alone while you write the next scenes in your novel, applying what you just learned from the critique to the new scenes. Promise yourself not to revise any scenes until you finish the first draft of the novel.
But what happens if a pantser tries to plan their novel?
Bad things happen. I’ve seen it numerous times.
The pantser will quickly get bored trying to plan their novel. They feel like the story isn’t fun anymore. And they’re right. Planning isn’t fun for pantsers. Planning is loads of fun for planners.
Bailee, it’s possible you’re a pantser trying to be a planner. That will take the steam out of your novel every time.
If that’s the case, then the solution is simple. Stop planning and just type the novel.
She could be afraid to write the next chapter and keeps telling herself that the first one isn’t good enough yet. That alone can hold a person back. And, as she’s had it critiqued to death then other peoples thoughts and opinions ripping apart that first chapter can be crippling!
Bailee dump the critics asap they aren’t the word of God. This is your story and only you can decide what they are right or wrong about. And often critics tend to be to be biased in some form or another. Another thing to watch out for is a toxic critic that says they give harsh and helpful criticism but lean more towards being negative for the sake of being negative.
Another thing to watch out for when asking for critiques on writing platforms is that they can have ulterior motive, such as needing to “read” enough books to have their own book read or wanting to get it done with quickly so they can, get their ‘payment’ faster, or doing so to collectpoints to unlock thkngs on the site. (On Wattpad you could ask cridics on there to give 1-3 chapters a critique and in return read their book, leave a comment and follow them.)
While this isn’t a big deal,and often work out great, a few years later on that site I started to see a pattern emerging. I’d ask for help, get some chapters critiqued and then go edit. Well, They’d come back,and rave at how much the edit fixed the mistakes. Yay, right? That went into the mud pit fast. I started to see almost carbon copys of the critiques that other cridics had left from before, (some years old!) saying I need to do this, there was a mistake here and such.
I had aready fixed those mistakes years ago. Or even worse I’d get a ‘critique’ that had nothing to do with my story characters or plot line at all.
(mind you the first few years this didn’t happen people were honest and helpful and helped me grow. I have no idea what happened to change this.)
So please while taking the critiques to heart and applying what they are teaching you is wonderful, take a step back for a day or two and double check that, yes you do have the mistakes they pointed out.
Thankfully most writing platforms and critique sites aren’t like this. But ya, if you’re rewriting that same chapter infinitely then something is very wrong! Please consider taking a break from critiques and just write! How can they critique a skeleton? Build the body first and they’ll have more to draw on.
Also… that first chapter might be dead. Go write the second you might like it way more then first one and decide to make it the first chapter.
When a book is draft, imop no more than two critiques per chapter after that mive on because I can almost guarantee that when it’s finished whole chapter will be deleted, rearanged, subplots deleated and such. Don’t waste time in the forever critiques the work has just started!
Keep going forward!
Sorry I wrote my comment in my notes and copyed all of it, please delete that! (Yes you can laugh. xP) This is my comment:
She could be afraid to write the next chapter and keeps telling herself that the first one isn’t good enough yet. That alone can hold a person back. And, as she’s had it critiqued to death then other peoples thoughts and opinions ripping apart that first chapter can be crippling!
Bailee dump the critics asap they aren’t the word of God. This is your story and only you can decide what they are right or wrong about. And often critics tend to be to be biased in some form or another. Another thing to watch out for is a toxic critic that says they give harsh and helpful criticism but lean more towards being negative for the sake of being negative.
Another thing to watch out for when asking for critiques on writing platforms is that they can have ulterior motive, such as needing to “read” enough books to have their own book read or wanting to get it done with quickly so they can, get their ‘payment’ faster, or doing so to collectpoints to unlock thkngs on the site. (On Wattpad you could ask cridics on there to give 1-3 chapters a critique and in return read their book, leave a comment and follow them.)
While this isn’t a big deal,and often work out great, a few years later on that site I started to see a pattern emerging. I’d ask for help, get some chapters critiqued and then go edit. Well, They’d come back,and rave at how much the edit fixed the mistakes. Yay, right? That went into the mud pit fast. I started to see almost carbon copys of the critiques that other cridics had left from before, (some years old!) saying I need to do this, there was a mistake here and such.
I had aready fixed those mistakes years ago. Or even worse I’d get a ‘critique’ that had nothing to do with my story characters or plot line at all.
(mind you the first few years this didn’t happen people were honest and helpful and helped me grow. I have no idea what happened to change this.)
So please while taking the critiques to heart and applying what they are teaching you is wonderful, take a step back for a day or two and double check that, yes you do have the mistakes they pointed out.
Thankfully most writing platforms and critique sites aren’t like this. But ya, if you’re rewriting that same chapter infinitely then something is very wrong! Please consider taking a break from critiques and just write! How can they critique a skeleton? Build the body first and they’ll have more to draw on.
Also… that first chapter might be dead. Go write the second you might like it way more then first one and decide to make it the first chapter.
When a book is draft, imop no more than two critiques per chapter after that mive on because I can almost guarantee that when it’s finished whole chapter will be deleted, rearanged, subplots deleated and such. Don’t waste time in the forever critiques the work has just started!
Keep going forward!
Sorry can you delete that? I wrote my comment in a writing app this time to try and catch typos.
And didn’t rekize I copied the whole thing!
She could be afraid to write the next chapter and keeps telling herself that the first one isn’t good enough yet.
That alone can hold a person back. And, as she’s had it critiqued to death then other peoples thoughts and opinions ripping apart that first chapter can be crippling!
Bailee dump the critics asap they aren’t the word of God. This is your story and only you can decide what they are right or wrong about. And often critics tend to be to be biased in some form or another.
Another thing to watch out for is a toxic critic that says they give harsh and helpful criticism but lean more towards being negative for the sake of being negative.
Watch out for when asking for critiques on writing platforms is that they might have ulterior motive, such as needing to “read” enough books to have their own book read or wanting to get it done with quickly so they can, get their ‘payment’ faster, or doing so to collectpoints to unlock thkngs on the site. (On Wattpad you could ask cridics on there to give 1-3 chapters a critique and in return read their book, leave a comment and follow them.)
While this isn’t a big deal,and often work out great, a few years later on that site I started to see a pattern emerging. I’d ask for help, get some chapters critiqued and then go edit.
They’d come back, and rave at how much the edit fixed the mistakes. Yay, right? That went into the mud pit fast. They posted almost carbon copys of the critiques that other cridics had left from before, (some years old!) saying I need to do this, there was a mistake here and such while only changing a wird here abd there.
I had aready fixed those mistakes years ago. Or even worse I’d get a ‘critique’ that had nothing to do with my story characters or plot line at all.
(The first few years this didn’t happen people were honest and helpful and helped me grow. I have no idea what happened to change this.)
Please while taking the critiques to heart and applying what they say and teach is wonderful, take a step back for a day or two and double check that, yes you do have the mistakes they pointed out.
Thankfully most writing platforms and critique sites aren’t like this. If you’re rewriting that same chapter infinitely then something is wrong! Please consider taking a break from critiques and just write! How can they critique a skeleton? Build the body first and they’ll have more to draw on.
Also… that first chapter might be dead. Go write the second. You might like it more then first one and decide to make it the first chapter.
When a book is draft, imop no more than two critiques per chapter after that mive on because I can almost guarantee that when it’s finished whole chapter will be deleted, rearanged, subplots change/deleted and such. Don’t waste time in the forever critiques, the work has just started!
Keep going forward!