Good morning everyone it is time for another task as we work towards planning our novels. Today’s task is yet another list. This one is definitely one where pictures or physical descriptions can come in handy. What I like to do is have my list in my handy dandy notebook and in the list mark down when I have a picture and then save a picture electronically in a set file. I always mark the name of the picture in the file on my list so I can find it and I always keep it in one separate files so that when I am finished with the novel I can delete the picture file if I need to. You can print your pictures out and put them in the notebook but I find that takes a lot of ink. Also you can keep electronic lists and just integrate the photos into the document. Personally I am a big believer in a cheap spiral bound notebook to use when I am working on a project.
Don’t get me wrong I love really pretty notebooks and journals, but when I am working on a novel a cheap spiral bound notebook is fabulous. I stock up on the inexpensive ones every fall when they are on sale. That way I can easily dedicate a notebook to a project and I don’t feel bad when I scribble things out or even need to tear out a page because I change my mind on some things. If I am working on a series, I will take the relevant information from the spiral notebook and migrate the parts I need to keep on reference for a series into a more expensive notebook that is meant to be kept. Then, the cheap one goes into recycling (or sometimes into garden compost). With the next book in the series, I will still use another spiral and again migrate the need to keep info to the nicer to be kept one.
I will also go through the electronic picture file and decide what needs to be kept and what needs to be deleted. That is just sort of my system.
But it has gotten us a bit off track. You know today’s task involves a list, but I haven’t told you what the list is yet have I? Nope. I got distracted by notebooks. So…
Today’s Task #24: Items of Importance (and yes I heard the echo-y announcer voice in my head as I typed that.) In every story there are going to be items of importance. It could be a childhood toy that sparks questions of the past. It could be the items in a backpack as our hero goes a-questing. A favorite pair of shoes that make our protagonist feel powerful counts if it plays a role in the story. It can also be vehicles and equipment.
For example, lets turn back to Bob. In our example story Bob dreams of leaving the lumber yard and getting back to what he wants to do which involves marine biology. At the end of the story I had Bob buying a boat and sailing off into the sunset. If it just pops up at the end I might not need to do more than scroll through images of boats on line and pull a few details for the final scene. But what if it is something he has been longing to purchase for a while but always talks himself out of?
Perhaps in his home office/lab space he has a corkboard with the boat of his dreams. Maybe, since he has been working at the lumber yard for ten years as the story progresses he periodically updates the picture of his dream boat, pinning a picture and the relevant stats over the old one. If that were the case then on Bob’s list of Items of Importance, I would have…
Corkboard
- Schedules and details of his current project pinned to it
- Brass sea creature shaped pins, octopi, shrimp, seahorses, clams, even Anchors or sailboats
- A thick section of images, all of boats and their details, one updated one on top of the other going back a decade pictures in fie: Boat 2015, Boat 2017, Boat2019, Boat2021, Boat2022, Boat2023, Boat2024, Boat2025
Boat purchased after the divorce
- Image Boat2025
- Specs…
At the moment I don’t have the specs as this is just an example and I am not researching this story. I might add Bob’s favorite socks or glasses or some other things that are of importance or relevance to Bob. There could also be dedicated equipment or even specific software he uses for the small jobs he takes. While those small jobs are probably going to be dealing with data and not field work, he could also have the equipment he would have used in the field in the closet. That too could go on the list. I should also point out that if I were writing this story I would have looked into Marine Biology more and come up with the specific sorts of jobs he might take.
For now this is our Task #24: list the items of importance to your character and story. Add descriptions and pictures where appropriate. Make a list of websites and other reference points you may want to come back to as you work as well.
If your main character works in a fantasy kitchen for example you may want to look up Medieval Kitchen implements. While you are bound to find pictures and descriptions of things you can use in your story you may not want to write them all down or download all the images. It may be easier to bookmark the site and open a tab when you are working on scenes that involve kitchen equipment. Just make a note of the site you have bookmarked so you can easily find it again. AS all of this is designed to line up information ahead of time so you don’t have to stop your writing to research and this lose momentum with you writing, you don’t want to lose track of sites you bookmarked as it sort of defeats the purpose.
And there we have it, our task for the day. Have fun with it and I will see you tomorrow for a bright and shiny new task.
Ten til Midnight 