It’s been about five months since I completed the first draft of ‘The Bezerker’, and I haven’t started the next edit yet.
But I haven’t been idle. I’ve been working on the novel. Just not in writing new words or editing. What I’ve been doing instead is something far more important, and also, quite interesting:
ENGINEERING
I’ve been ‘engineering’ the novel. It was part of a new process I’ve been trying. Firstly I created a beat sheet: the scene, location, what happens, what the scene accomplishes, how many words in it and what emotions the beat/scene covers. With it all laid out I can review the whole story in a page – have I hit all the right notes? Is there repetition? Enough new scenes? Do each character get a chance to shine? Do the major plot points happen at the right points? etc…
Next I reviewed ALL character interactions. Every character, minor or major and how they interact with every other character. How do they feel about each other? Do they like, love, hate or tolerate one another?
After that I confirmed the transition scenes (between different parts of the novel, BEFORE and AFTER the major plot points, then put together a synopsis, updated from the original ‘pre-draft’ synopsis for anything that had changed during the writing process.
Finally, and the process that took the longest, was going through a 20 page sequence of questions and answering them. This questionnaire was put together by Art Holcomb, a Hollywood screen writer and teacher who runs many writing courses from his blog (http://artholcomb.blogspot.com). This questionaire had been put together over many years by Art with input from his mentors such as Brannon Braga of Star Trek The Next Generation fame. Some of my favourite episodes of Star Trek TNG are written by Braga, such as Parallels and Cause and Effect, episodes with clear plot structure, put together by someone who understands how to put a story together – someone to learn from! (As a complete aside, that moment in Parallels, when Crazy Bearded Riker from the Borg Invasion timeline screams that he isn’t going back? – damn I still get shivers thinking about it – that was one of the most memorable moments in all of the TNG for me).
These questions look at various aspects of the story and cut to the heart of the matter, and make you as a writer ask some very honest questions of your work. It was a lot of hard questions, a lot of soul searching. It was all a bit of a pain in the arse actually. I wanted to be writing! But these questions consistently made me go back to my beat sheet and re-evaluate what I had done and if it was missing something or could be done better.
When I wrote Elite: And Here The Wheel I had many restrictions – I was in someone else’s universe that wasn’t fleshed out when I wrote my novel, I was restricted by this pre-made universe, and I had a timeframe to work in if I wanted to launch my novel with the game itself.
With ‘The Bezerker‘ however, none of those restrictions are there. I can write (or naval gaze) at my own pace, the universe is fully mine. I had devised the rules and history many years ago, as I’ve based other stories in this universe already.
So I’ve taken my time to make sure I am answering these questions honesty, and in depth. My goal is simple: Make ‘The Bezerker’ the best possibly story I can write, without compromise. If you have ready Elite: And Here The Wheel you’ll know I like action and broken, ‘grey’ characters. This continues, all the characters are complex, damaged beasts with their own issues, but I wanted take it further, more about character, and choices, and what makes people tick. Do they stand up and fight or do they run away and hide? Do they accept their losses or try and reclaim what they have lost?
Another writing coach, Larry Brooks, explains in his ‘Story Engineering‘ book that there are three layers to each character: 1) What they show the world, 2) The reason they show this to the world and 3)What they actually do when the chips are down. All my characters are put under duress, and they need to choose what kind of person they are and what is important to them. What is important at their core being?
This questionnaire has also made sure that I take opportunities to amp up the pressure and stress of the story through relationships.
So quietly I’ve been whittling away at these questions, padding out my beat sheet with notes, expanding, adding, cutting, changing focus and bringing everything into alignment to make the story the best possible version it can be. I’ve taken my novel and engineered the shit out of it.
It was a slog, but its done now. Now it’s time to put all of this back into the text. It’s time to start rewriting!