~ in which our author discusses how he goes about putting words onto paper ~

Everyone has their own way of writing stories and some of those will be seat-of-their-pants writers who just grab a pen/laptop and go nuts all over a page or hundred. My biggest bugbear in my own writing is continuity. Since I am creating a world from the ground up, I should know it inside out, back to front, at glancing angle and everything in between. So if there’s a hole in it somewhere? Unacceptable.

As such, I like to use a couple of tricks to get around those problems. The first is a method of working that I discovered in university, just in time for my final dissertation, and is what I refer to as the Fill In The Gaps Method. It might have a technical name but I like my name better.

Fill In The Gaps Method

Write down the broadest strokes possible of what’s going to happen.

• The cat sat on the mat
• The front door opened
• The cat went inside

That’s day one.

Go to bed. Visit a friend. You’ve made some progress. It’s not written in stone though so what does it matter? Easy.

Now come back to it in the afternoon. Or the next day. Whatever. Elaborate a bit in between those. Link them together.

The cat sat on the mat.

• The cat knocked on the door.

The front door opened.

• The cat didn’t like the look of what was inside.

The cat went inside.

So far so good. It’s all making sense but it’s not so cumbersome that we couldn’t change it if we had to.

The cat sat on the mat and knocked on the door.

• “What’s the password” said the voice coming through the letterbox.
• “Fill In The Gaps,” replied the cat.

The front door opened and he was hit by a stench that made him crinkle his nose.

• The cat had seen some horrible things in his time but whatever was in there was going to be worse. He just knew it.

The cat went inside because he knew that only in there would he find the answers he needed.

It’s all about elaboration and linking. Obviously I use this process over the course of an entire novel’s worth of material so then it’s just a case of recognising when to stop going back to the links and actually start getting down to the meaty content.

Software Usage

The other trick I use, and probably hundreds of others do too, is using some kind of writing software that lets you tag different notes or sections. I personally use Evernote to do this and during the Fill In The Gaps phase, I tag each new section with the characters involved and locations visited. This allows me to fairly easily chart each character’s progression, keeping tabs on who they’ve met before and where they are meant to be at a certain time/event.

The program I use for the bulk of my writing has changed since I started writing. At first it was just scrappy Word documents that ended up getting a bit clunky, so I tried out the free trial for Scrivener and really enjoyed it. It was a very useful way of storing different chapters, character portfolios and world building notes in one place.

However, when my MacBook went kaput I found myself looking for a cheaper alternative. I got myself a delightful little Chromebook (which I can hook up to my TV via HDMI and write big screen) and redistributed my different files to Google Drive. I’m a couple of months into it now and have to say that it is incredibly convenient having Google Drive as my central storage. I can access my notes anywhere, make amendments or jot down new ideas on the fly and I have the piece of mind that should my Chromebook explode or be eaten by a rabid gorilla, my stories are safe and sound in the cloud.

Character Building

I’ve found that the most useful way of producing a character often boils down to one question.

Why?

Everything a person does, or doesn’t do, is based on a combination of personality type, predisposition to certain responses and past experiences of similar situations. And these things are all linked to each other as well. So why should the characters we create be any different? They are meant to be people we invest and believe in, so what they do has to be human (or if they’re not human, at least make sense).

To top it off, the “why” aspect of a character is arguably the most interesting part. Unless you’ve come just for the light show and the punch-ups, the “why” is what makes books enjoyable. Not that there’s anything wrong with the light show of course, but a bit of depth is what makes a character stick in your head for years afterwards.

Often, the method I use to create backstory will be to think of the point at which a new character is introduced and, knowing what I want them to do in that scene, work my way backwards into their past to discover their motivations for doing that. There may be times when a fleshed out backstory isn’t really necessary so it can be condensed to a key phrase:

• Jealousy
• Pride
• Optimist
• Realist
• Spurned in love
• Duty

Generating an interesting backstory from any one of these, or a combination, provides more substance to a character. It also provides you with a springboard for a character arc throughout their journey. Overcoming pride and learning to temper optimism with reality could be good examples. Character growth is something I’m a strong believer in, especially when novels span months or years of a character’s life. Only the most boring people don’t change with time so why write them?