Guest Post: {Coming up with the idea for your novel}

 A little while ago I wrote about my yearning to write a novel - and the very many problems that come with setting yourself such a ginormous goal. I've found much inspiration in the weekly emails I've been receiving from Now Novel and have found the website to be an incredibly helpful tool. I must admit that I haven't started just yet, but with my wedding looming and a baby on the way, I think I can be forgiven! I'm really looking forward to the quiet period after our wedding and before I return to work in 2013, and I'm hoping that I'll find a few quiet moments every day to at least start writing my novel - especially now that I have some helpful tips from successful author and co-founder of Now Novel, Bridget McNulty. Read on! 

So you’ve got a burning desire to write a novel, it’s on your Bucket List, you know you have to do it one day… You’re just not sure what exactly to write about. Don’t worry, you’re not alone. Not even nearly alone, in fact. Coming up with the central idea for your novel is probably the hardest part of the process. That, and finishing the actual writing, of course!

When my brother and I decided we wanted to create an online novel writing course, it was mainly because people kept emailing me and saying, “You’ve written a novel, I want to write a novel, what do I do?” Now Novel (www.nownovel.com) is the answer to that question. We’ve tried to make it as simple and painless as possible to start – and finish – your novel.

But back to the question at hand: what exactly should your novel be about? People used to ask me that all the time, and I would start talking to them about their passions, the underlying themes that make them tick. “What can you talk about endlessly without getting bored?” I’d ask. “What do you love reading about, and listening to? What gets you excited?” The problem with all these questions – valuable as they are – is that they’re all a little vague. So we created a section on Now Novel, right in the beginning, called Central Idea (http://www.nownovel.com/ideas_finder) in which you uncover what, exactly, you’re going to write about.

It’s a question and answer process, and the kind of thing you don’t want to rush through – I always think it should be done on a quiet afternoon, with a cup of tea. There are a whole lot of aspects to think about, broadly divided into things you notice around you (what we pay attention to is always revealing), unusual situations and people you can imagine, what you love daydreaming about and where your passions lie. Because the questions are direct, they help to open the imagination up to ideas you might not have thought of before, and what you get from the first half of this process is a list of different characters, situations and environments (which is just another way of saying protagonists, plot and setting). From here, you get to choose your favourites, the ones that make your pulse quicken and get you excited about finding out more. This turns into your Central Idea – but it doesn’t stop there. A day later, once you’ve had time to let the idea settle, we have a handy little tool called the Story Tester which makes you put this idea through fire to see if it’s actually what you want to be spending all your time on.

And then? Then the real work begins! The characters, the plot development, the setting ideas and images… It’s all there, waiting for you to unlock once you have that first key: the Central Idea.

One of the things we feel strongly about at Now Novel (www.nownovel.com) is getting people started on the novel writing process, so we’re giving away the first third of the course for free. Head on over to our website (www.nownovel.com), our blog (www.nownovel.com/blog) or our Facebook page (www.facebook.com/nownovel) and say hi – I’d love to meet you.

Until then, keep writing!

Bridget McNulty