How I cracked the impossible mission of writing a novel ... and how it really wasn't all that hard.
I considered myself a short story writer. The kind of guy who quietly cranks out a story a week. Opens the loop, closes the loop. In and out like a high-speed getaway. Stories that slap you in the face and run into the distance, leaving you sore and red-cheeked, wondering what the hell just happened.
But somehow … yesterday I finished writing my first novel.
It came to 75k words. Which is ten times longer than anything I’ve ever written before. And it didn’t take me a year like I always thought it would. It took me 7 weeks.
7 measly weeks!
I’ve tried before, though. I’ve got a few unfinished novels on the old hard drive, some ideas, some characters, some nonsense. Every time I tried to write one I’d start off strong but fizzle out after a few chapters and melt into a neurotic mess on the floor.
But as we entered the second half of 2015, I decided to get serious with my writing. I needed to create a novel, no, an IP (intellectual property), to create a series of books. A funnel that would lead readers from one story to the next. I wanted to create my own Discworld.
So I started writing The Hipster From Outer Space — a sort of sci-fi thriller about an alien who wakes up as a human in East London. It’s a cross between Dr. Who and Game Of Thrones. It’s Douglas Adams with blood and bite and teeth. It’s the culmination of a few ideas I’ve been ruminating on for the past few years.
This time would be different, though. I needed to stack the deck in my favour. I refused to fail again.
1.) Write It In Parts
I started out thinking that the book would be split into 6 parts. Each one around 15k words. I told myself that I would write Part 1 in a week and I would be done. I would come back and write Part 2 when I felt the impetus to do so … next Christmas or something.
So I got up every morning and wrote a couple of thousand words before heading off to the day job. By the end of the week I had my first 15k. I was due to stop. But I didn’t. I carried on. The train was already moving
“A body in motion tends to stay in motion unless acted on by an outside force.” Issac The Newton
I was already in the habit of getting up with the twilight hours, my fingers already tapping away on the duvet. I just needed to move my body to the keyboard. So I thought … may as well write Part 2 now then.
And then guess what happened at the end of the next week? Part 3 was done, and then part 4, 5, 6. I rode that wave like that surfer who punches sharks, all the way to the finish line. Which is also the beach. Beach Bar’s open. Come on in the sand is fine. Have a Daiquiri. Is that shark waiting tables?
2.) Grow A Beard
I’ve always been partial to a few follicles on the old thinking chin. Something to keep my fingers busy when I’m in public, but I’d always trim the beast down after a week or two.
NOT ANYMORE!
I started growing my beard and I didn’t allow myself to cut it until I’d written those all important last words “The End” — which is also what my last words will be.
Week 1: I started out like this.
Yes that’s a bottle of soda on my head.
Week 7: 75000 words later. I ended up like this.
Yes that’s a bottle of rum on my head.
The beard was getting so out of control it was about to invade the shores of France like a tentacled sea-beast from the deep. It had its own side of the bed. It could speak several foreign languages. Worst of all … I couldn’t drink Cappucino without dunking my mustache in there. I looked like a fool dammit. A FOOL!
Every day passed meant more beard. I had to hurry and get the word count done before the family disowned me.
3.) Get Your 25 Minute Sprint On
I was using Pomodoro for most of this draft. Which is basically bursts of 25 minutes of working solid interspersed with 5-minute breaks.
I started out challenging myself to write 500 good words in 25 minutes. And then once I was hitting that, I moved onto 550 words. Then 600. Then 650. You get the idea. By the end of it I was working to 800 words in a 25-minute period. On my best day I got four Pomodoros in and reached the 3200 words mark for that day. Boom.
4.) Get Someone To Beta-Read As You Write
Because I was trying to create a finished Part every week, I was able to send them to my friend/associate/mistress every week and he was able to ask me questions like “Why are your characters insane? Did your protag mean to spill that milkshake? Who are you and why are you sending me these writings?”.
This was a massive boon, and not just because I like the word boon. It allowed me to course correct. I was able to navigate the icebergs (unlike those other idiots on that deathtrap).
“Iceberg straight ahead,” my beta-reader would say, and I would turn the wheel, head for clearer waters, find some sharks to punch.
5.) Tell Everyone You’re Writing A Novel
There’s a whole dealio here about accountability. You tell someone you’re going to do something, and if you don’t they pelt you with bars of soap … or something.
I told everyone I was writing a novel and that I only had so long to finish it. I told my mum, dad, cat, and even that homeless man who refused to share his Lucozade.
It got to the point where if I didn’t finish the novel, I would’ve felt like a massive failure.
And that … would not be a boon.
An Anti-Boon.
Aunty and Uncle Boon.
Anyway.
What about you? What do you do? Are you a shark-puncher or more of an old-fashioned dolphin-kicker? How do you get your work done?
Luke Kondor is a filmmaker and writer. He started writing on his computer in his early teens and never looked back, and now he’s got really sore eyes.
He’s part of the digital story studio — Hawk & Cleaver where he helps to create the best new stories for you to watch, read, sniff, and absorb.