The Complete Idiot's Guide to Writing a Novel (The Complete Idiot's Guides)

649 Pages·2004·2.94 MB·English

by  Monteleone Thomas F

Table of Contents
Title Page
Dedication
Copyright Page
Foreword
Introduction
Part 1 - An Overview
Chapter 1 - So You Want to Be a Writer
Chapter 2 - Creativity and Talent Chapter 2
Chapter 3 - Looking at “The List”
Chapter 4 - Genres and the Mainstream
Chapter 5 - Reading to Write
Part 2 - The Elements of Writing a Novel
Chapter 6 - Plot—Finding One and Making It Work
Chapter 7 - Characters—My People Calling Your People
Chapter8 - Setting—Location Is Chapter 8 Everything
Chapter 9 - Dialogue—You Gotta Have an Ear for It
Chapter 10 - The Other Stuff—Transition, Point of View, Pacing
Part 3 - The Process of Writing a Novel
Chapter 11 - Research—Getting It Right
Chapter 12 - Format, Presentation, Grammar, and Syntax
Chapter13 - Style and Voice—Finding Yours
Chapter 14 - Time Management and Discipline
Chapter 15 - Another Name for Writing Is Rewriting
Part 4 - Revisions and Beyond
Chapter 16 - Common Mistakes Chapter 16
Chapter 17 - Other Sources of Help
Chapter 18 - Marketing and Publicity
Chapter 19 - The Business of Writing
Chapter 20 - The People of Publishing
Appendix A - Interviews with Bestselling Writers
Appendix B - Glossary
Index
This one is for all my new friends, who will read this book and go on to create
great novels.
It’s been fun … Keep it that way.
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Copyright © 2004 by Thomas F. Monteleone
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Foreword
I wish this book had been around when I started writing. It would have saved me
a great deal of guessing and wishing and hoping and praying, and otherwise
stumbling around in the dark.
When I first began to write, it was in a complete vacuum. I didn’t know there
were such things as writer’s groups (either the in-person kind or the online
variety) or books about how to write. I had never met a real, live, honest-to-gosh
writer. I thought that authors were all famous people who lived in big houses,
like Stephen King and Ann Rice; or who, when they weren’t writing, hung
around the Algonquin Hotel drinking martinis and saying incredibly witty
things, in the manner of the late Robert Benchley and Dorothy Parker.
I was about 99 percent wrong on the whole deal, a victim of media hype and the
understandable fantasies of a fledgling author.
The part I was right about—and the part that I didn’t mention previously because
it never occurred to me when I first started—was that writing turned out to be
something that gave me a great deal of satisfaction. I found that I took pleasure
in stringing together words in a way that was sometimes clever, sometimes heart
wrenching, and (hopefully) always made sense.
I was lucky enough to sell my very first novel fairly quickly so there was no long
series of rejection slips with which to paper my walls. Of course, it didn’t sell for
very much, but it was sold to a bona fide New York publisher. Nothing gave me
as big a thrill until the next year, when I finally held my first paperback in my
hot little hands.
The book you’re holding right now will give you a much better chance, as a
first-time novelist, of actually seeing print—and getting paid for it.
Between these covers, Tom Monteleone has authored a completely accessible,
fun to read, nuts-and-bolts book. It covers everything from what kind of font you
should use in your manuscript—and other things you never think about until you
actually sit down and face that blank screen—to punctuation, building
characters, setting “hooks,” writing cover letters, marketing, and beyond.
And also, he demonstrates how to keep a sense of humor about you at all times.
—Ellen Recknor
Ellen Recknor has authored upwards of 35 novels under her own name as well as
a variety of pseudonyms. She is a two-time winner of the Western Writers of
America’s Spur Award, has won the Willa Cather Literary Award, and has been
nominated for the Pulitzer Prize.
Introduction
Who am I?
And why you should listen to me?
Listen, I’m just a guy who likes to write, and has written a lot of stuff …
including 25 novels.
I’ve spent most of my adult life writing and avoiding all the grown-up-people
jobs. During that stretch of time, I’ve learned a lot of things—mostly self-taught
—that helped me get better at what I do. Self-taught means a lot of rumblin’-
stumblin’-fumblin’ my way through the world of writing and publishing. It
means trial and error, frustration, and rejection.
I hope I can help you avoid much of that sort of thing. In fact, I’m going to make
you a promise to be informative and entertaining. If you want to spend your time
writing a novel, I believe it should be fun, not work. If you want work, go get a
gig in a pie factory or selling vacuum cleaners door-to-door.
I want you to move through this book with a growing confidence that will come
from familiarity with me and a belief in your own abilities. There’s no magic or
secret knowledge in the writing of a novel. There are techniques, guidelines, and
even a few tricks to make it a rewarding endeavor; but you’ll see, as we move
from topic to topic, it’s not much harder than making a six-foot model of the
Statue of Liberty out of Lego blocks.
Just different.
Anyway, before we get started, a little more about me, which should help you
believe what I’ll be telling you, and a few words of coach-in-the-locker-room
inspiration before we go rushing to our keyboards to kick serious butt. I figure