Starting to write a novel can seem daunting. How to get from
0 words to 100,000? Every time I begin a new book, it feels like I’m staring up
the side of a mountain, wondering how I’m going to survive the long, long
climb. I imagine that, in my metaphorical rucksack, all I have is my love for
writing, a few ideas for the story, and an interesting character or two.
Sometimes that doesn’t seem like much -- but it’s got to be enough to get me
going.
As I’ve become more comfortable with my own novel-writing
process, I’ve discovered a few ways to give myself a head-start. (Think:
beginning a hike at a 2,000-meter base camp rather than at sea level.) One of
my favorite ways to world-build a book is to write short stories. Whether a
story spends time with a character or explores my setting, it brings me into
the world of my novel and asks me to think about that world in a different way.
I stumbled upon this process through trial and error. About
eight years ago, when I started the draft that would eventually become my first
completed novel, I envisioned the book as a family saga. So I wrote 50k about
one generation, then 50k about the next (somewhere around here a family curse
got thrown in, naturally), and then 50k about the next … only to discover that
the great-granddaughter (who appeared in generation No. 3) was actually the
character I wanted to write the book about. So then I wrote the actual novel
about her. In essence, I’d done 150k of prewriting. Ouch!, I thought at the time. What
a waste! Of course, as most authors will tell you, no writing is a waste,
especially with early books. Those were hours logged that served to hone my
craft and help me find the real story I wanted to tell. Plus, I had a rich
family history written out that I used to bring depth and complexity to my protagonist’s
story.
That manuscript is shelved now, always special to me because
it was my first completed book. It wasn’t until my third completed manuscript
that I had a novel strong enough to capture interest from my agent and my
editor. By then, I’d figured out that writing a whole other novel was not the most efficient
word-building exercise, and I’d reined that in to the technique I’m sharing
here: world-building through short stories.
What this looks like is completely flexible, depending upon
your needs and your style. I find it most helpful to write a world-building
short story (WBSS) either about a character or the setting. A WBSS can be a
piece of flash-fiction or a fleshed-out, 5,000-word narrative. I like long-form
pieces (yes, I’m a novelist at heart), so I’m usually comfortable with
5,000-word WBSSs. But it can also be a useful challenge to myself as a writer
to build a story in 2,000 words or less. Go with what works best for you!
Stories About Characters
When writing a WBSS about a character, consider choosing one
of your secondary (or even tertiary) characters. This will help you avoid the
trap of flat, unremarkable supporting characters. Consider a book that has a
crime boss as a secondary character, and this crime boss has henchmen (tertiary
characters). You could have one of her men be a Large, Slow Henchman and not
much else. But what if you wrote a story about him, and along the way
discovered something about his family; what drove him to violent, underpaid
work; what his favorite smell is, and his least-favorite part of his body? Now
when he appears in scenes as you draft your novel, he will have tics and unique
reactions to situations and a history with roots that extend far off the page.
Another benefit of choosing a secondary or tertiary
character is that they will likely have a totally different personal and
situational POV than your main character. Take L.S. Henchman again, and
consider what parts of your book world he would know and see versus those your
main character (say, a middle-class professor) knows and sees. When you explore
your book world through L.S. Henchman’s eyes, you’re making it richer by
default by using such a different lens -- and you can draw upon that richness
when drafting the novel itself.
Stories About Setting
When writing a WBSS about your setting, consider it an
opportunity to do research. Look for anecdotes or information you might not
otherwise have woven into your story. This is a great way to come across other
(real) stories that might spark episodes or events in your book. For historical
novels, looking into a town’s past might bring you to old newspaper articles
about disappearances, celebrations, or conflicts that you can incorporate into
your own story. For contemporary novels, reading up on the politics or
residents of an area can give you a deeper understanding of your setting in the
context of the larger world. (Note: Researching may not be applicable to
certain genres, like fantasy or some SpecFic. In cases where there is no
research possible, try using WBSSs to set and explore world rules or other
things you must create, like topography, language, or social norms.)
Benefits of This Method
On top of the world-building benefits, there are other
reasons to write WBSSs. Depending on how much you care to polish a certain
piece -- and how well it stands on its own -- you may want to submit it to
magazines or websites for publication. I strongly encourage you to submit short
fiction to these outlets. Why? 1) It’s practice for pitching your work. 2) It
helps you get accustomed to rejection (a fact of life in the writing world). 3)
It helps you get accustomed to acceptance (celebrate your successes!). 4) Publishing
short fiction will start building your reader base. 5) Publishing short fiction
will build your creative resume/portfolio.
Another benefit of writing WBSSs is that they are relatively
low-commitment. Say you have an idea for a book, but you’re not sure if it’s
enough to charge ahead with and pour countless hours into. (Think back to the
mountain I mentioned, and being intimidated by the sheer scale of starting a
novel from a blank page.) If you write a WBSS, you’re only committing to a
short story. Some of the pressure -- and some of the fear -- is taken away when
you think in increments of 5,000 words, rather than 100,000. And if you
complete the story and love it, you’ll have 5,000 words of material to draw
from for your book draft.
I hope this post inspires you to try the WBSS method. Have
you tried writing short stories as a world-building technique before? What
other world-building methods work for you when you’re starting a new novel?
Katrina Carrasco is a queer Latinx writer, born and raised
in Southern California and now living in Seattle. In her novels and short
stories she explores the ideas of passing, performance, and belonging: what is
gained and what is lost by conforming to societal expectations of gender, race,
class and sexuality. Her short fiction has appeared in Witness Magazine, Post Road
Magazine, Quaint Magazine, and other journals. Her debut novel, CIPHER, will
be released in Fall 2018 by MCD/Farrar, Straus and Giroux. CIPHER follows Alma
Rosales, a queer woman and ex-Pinkerton detective, as she switches between
female and male disguises to investigate an opium-smuggling ring.
Website: katrinacarrasco.com
Twitter: @katrinacarrasco
Blog: kmcarrasco.blogspot.com
Goodreads Page for CIPHER: goodreads.com/book/show/34041372-cipher
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