I’ll let you in on a little secret. Two secrets, actually.

The first is this: no two authors plan a novel the same way. That may sound obvious to you, but the second is a little less obvious: no two books are planned and written the same way, not even by the same author. Each book is different, and it’s been my experience that each book comes with its own unique challenges to address.

That being said, it would be inefficient for me or any author to start from scratch every time I begin a new novel. As Stephen King wisely instructs in his book, On Writing, an author should always have tools.

I have a few writing tools that I’ve put a lot of effort into developing over the years—and I’m still developing them. They allow me a bit of a head start when I sit down to plot a new story—a head start I can’t afford to set aside or ignore.

I want to tell you what my tools are and how I use them, whether because you’re curious or because they could benefit you in some way as a writer. But just so you’re aware, these tools are primarily for novelists. Yes, the general principles can be used for any kind of writing, but I have adapted them for fiction writing.

Here’s the list of tools I’ll be discussing:

Brainstorming
Pre-production
Research
Titles
Revisions
Clippings
Post-production

There is no specific order to tools 1-6. The only order that matters is that Pre-production should come much earlier than Post-production. For the rest, I like to jump around depending on which tool I need at the moment. You may create folders or buy notebooks for each tool. Me? I use the notetaking app called Obsidian to keep track of everything. It’s free for personal use and it’s open source.

Disclaimer on Writing Styles

There is a spectrum upon which every writer falls. At one end, you have the Outliners. On the other, you have the Pantsers (so termed because they write “by the seat of their pants”). George R.R. Martin calls the former architects and the latter, gardeners. I like these terms much better.

Architects plan ahead while gardeners plant seeds and watch them grow, and adjust as necessary. I used to be a gardener. Now, I am closer to the architect side of things. I do a lot of front-loading when it comes to writing my stories. This means I do a lot of the work up front before I begin. I want to know what my story is before I write it. I outline my plot and characters ahead of time.

This may not be your style—and that’s totally fine—but I wouldn’t click away from this page just yet. I outline, yes, but when I finally sit down to write, I explore like a gardener, using my outline as a guide. My philosophy is that architects can learn a lot from gardeners and vice versa.

Where on the Architect-Gardener spectrum do you sit as a writer?

If you’re a gardener, what can you learn from me, an architect, that might make you a better writer? If you’re an architect, what can you learn from the way I do things?

Keep those questions in mind as you read. Now, without further ado, jet’s jump in!

Brainstorming

By far the most energizing part of the entire writing process. It’s also the most judgment-free stage. It still requires writing—a lot of it. When I get an idea, I write it down. I’m a hoarder of ideas. I don’t like throwing anything away.

You could say Brainstorming might be a part of the Pre-production stage of writing, but as you’ll eventually see, what we’re really doing when we brainstorm is writing down ideas for the Pre-production and Research stages.

I always imagine working with clay. Brainstorming is finding the clay you want to work with, while pre-production is assembling the clay together on the potter’s wheel. Research is learning how you want to cook the clay. Brainstorming allows you to put everything and anything down that you want. Pre-production and Research allow you to pick and choose what you want to eventually include in the final piece.

Brainstorming is for the story elements you may end up using, the characters you may end up writing about, the wild frontiers your story may end up going. Again, there is no judgment here. Brainstorming is for both the refined and the basest of ideas. You don’t have to use all of it. The hope is that you can use most of what you write down in the final story.

Write down crap. Write down gold. Get everything out of your head and on paper, or on a word processing document. This is safe space for you. Some people will use writing prompts. I’m not a fan of prompts, but to each their own. The only requirement is that you must try to gear it toward a story you want to tell. Otherwise it’s useless to you. But that’s the point of brainstorming. Get out the good and useless stuff. Later, use the good stuff and leave the useless stuff behind.

Remember this one rule about brainstorming: It’s better to have too much than not enough.

You might think that’s all you really need to know about brainstorming. I’ve talked about what brainstorming is. Now, let’s talk about what it isn’t.

Brainstorming isn’t where you put your research. Brainstorming gives you ideas for what to research later. (If you get an idea for research, jump over to your Research section and put it there. Brainstorming should feed into that section.) Brainstorming isn’t supposed to be sensible. Research is. Brainstorming doesn’t have to be grounded in reality. Research does.

Brainstorming isn’t where you think about the title for your your story. Go to the Titles section for that. And again, it bears repeating, Brainstorming isn’t Pre-production. Pre-production is where we will start to build structure. Brainstorming does not require structure.

Brainstorming begins with step one: getting a sheet of paper, blank for a reason.

Step two: fill it up.

Step three: repeat.

Pre-production

Brainstorming is where you begin, but Pre-production isn’t necessarily the next step in the process. Most of the time, you will skip over to Pre-production and live in Research or Titles for a while. Heaven forbid you jump all the way to Post-production. Only do that if:

1. you’ve completed your novel, and

2. you know what your novel is

(FYI: completing your novel and knowing what it is are two very different things. Begin Post-Production when you know both.)

I digress.

As I mentioned above, this stage is all about creating structure for your story. Ideas you’ve written down from your Brainstorming and Research sections will feed into this section. The only reason Research is placed after Pre-production is because I tend to grow impatient, but you may want to do Brainstorming first, then Research, then Pre-production. Up to you.

(I usually jump back and forth between these first three sections anyway, so the order doesn’t necessarily matter. At the end of the day, you WILL spend most of your time in Pre-production.)

Much like Brainstorming, Pre-production is about ideation, but with more intent and purpose. This is where you switch from playing in the mud to planning your sand castle. This is where you take into account your premise, the challenges/problems you’ll face as a the writer, who your best POV character(s) will be, what conflicts you will use, etc.

You will also flesh out the important characters, which means not all your characters will have a flaw or need. Just the important ones. Just the ones you need to tell the story.

You’ll flesh out their weaknesses, needs, desires, values, social statuses, abilities, justifications, attitudes, beliefs, worldviews, morals, motivations, secrets, romantic frictions, priorities, and expectations.

You’ll establish the story world, noting down lands, peoples, technologies, systems, natural settings, weather systems, seasons, natural and man-made spaces, holidays. Look at the politics, economies, religions, sciences, education systems, agricultural institutions, arts, and magic systems. Draw a map. Draw several maps if need be.

List every chapter and scene that comes to mind. Organize them. Structure them. You may not use every one you write down, but you should construct something that resembles a plot outline.

Understand what genre and subgenre you’re writing in and the various conventions that come with them. Write them down. If you’re a visual person, draw the shape of your story (again, in an organized way as opposed to disorganized Brainstorming).

Write down the theme or themes of your story. (This is a big one, and I don’t have the space to explain it here. Refer to The Anatomy of Story by John Truby if you’re interested.)

Pre-production is all about beginning to make sense of the senseless. You’re not quite writing the story yet, but you’re crafting it. When you’re finished, you’ll have an idea of what it will look like. What it will become.

Research

Research is another blank page, much like Brainstorming. However, most of it won’t be your own writing.

You may get an idea during Brainstorming or Pre-production, and you’ll go to Google or Bing—or whatever search engine you use—and you’ll look up something like “the migration patterns of monarch butterflies” or “why were monarch butterflies temporarily on the endangered species list?” or “monarchs of 15th century England and France”.

The key here is to look for answers from credible sources, and, no, Wikipedia is NOT a credible source. The English teacher in me cringes at the thought…

The only thing Wikipedia is good for, however, is pointing you toward possible credible sources:

Look up an article that interests you
Go to the bottom of the page
Click on the sources cited there
Read them and take what’s relevant and credible

Another avenue of Research is using scholar.google.com. It’s free. Use it.

Or, you can do traditional research and apply for a local library card. Turns out, knowledge and learning really is free. Whatever you do, don’t simply rely on Wikipedia or non-credible sources. How can you know if they’re credible? Here are some helps for you:

Look for official domain names on websites (.edu, .gov, etc.)
Who is the author? What are their credentials? Are they qualified to speak on the subject? Check the Contact page. Look for experts.
Compare what the author has said to other credible sources.
Is the source relevant to the topic of your story? Does it meet your needs?
Is the source current? Is it older than 5 years from today’s date? 10 years? 20? Follow the most current sources you can find.

If you think you don’t need to research for your fiction novel, you’re wrong.

How do I know this? Because even if you’re just writing a memoir, research is ALWAYS part of the writing process. Bar none. You don’t want to publish your book and then deal with the inevitable backlash when readers point out that King Henry VIII, who makes an appearance in your novel, died in 1547, and your novel is set in the year 1600.

Honest mistake? Just a typo? No, you had months to read up on that little piece of history.

A word of warning: Unless you had Henry stumble into a time machine, there’s no excuse. There is no forgiveness on Earth or in Heaven for authors who refuse to use Google correctly. Learn how to use Google!

“Google is God’s gift to writers.” —Orson Scott Card

This is, of course, hyperbole. But then again, is it? Do your research. (And yes, OSC actually said that. I was there. I wrote it down. If you ask him, he will corroborate me.)

Lastly, please don’t plagiarize. You can use your Research section to paste information directly from the internet. This is for your use only. No one else will see this. Don’t copy/paste any of it directly into your book. Few things can end your writing career as quickly as plagiarism. Fiction doesn’t require citing your sources, but the accuracy of your information amounts to the same thing.

Titles

Teachers, professors, and mentors will tell you to develop a title before you start writing. I think it’s a good idea because it helps you get an idea for what your story is. However, you don’t have to have the title set in stone before you start writing. Just a title. Unless you’re 100% certain of your title, the real one can pop up later—perhaps even while you’re writing the story.

This section is for brainstorming your titles, obviously, and that’s it. It should only be a bullet-point list of titles that come to mind. Even the crappy ones.

Yes, there are bad titles. The science of coming up with good titles for your story is a delicate one. Each title is inherent within the story you’re writing, so there’s no One Good Way to come up with one. If you’re planning on treading the traditional path of publication (i.e. through a publishing house), then the title may not be up to you, but rather the marketing department.

Still, people will like you more if you’ve done the work and come up with an exceptional title already—even if they end up changing it later.

So here’s the science behind coming up with a good title.

First, know your tone and use vocabulary that you use in your story to support that tone.
Second, and most importantly, know your themes. What is the beating heart of your novel? What characters or symbols best embody the beating heart? Consider whether that character’s or symbol’s role should be the title (i.e. “The Lord of the Rings” refers to Sauron, the principle antagonist. Arguably, he is the most important character because without him, there would be no story. “Dune” is the nickname of the planet, Arrakis, which isn’t just the principle setting where everything is taking place, it’s the reason for the entire conflict throughout the series.)
Thirdly, look at other bestselling stories in the same genre as yours and note down how the titles are structured. “____ of the ____” or “The ______” or simply using a single word “_____”. Note where the prepositions are in the titles. Consider structuring it similarly if you can.

Titles are tough, so don’t stress out too much about it up front. Sometimes I’ll come up with a title I really like, run it past some of my friends, and end up changing it later. So don’t become too attached to a title initially. They can change—sometimes frequently.

Revisions

By the time you need this section, you’ll already have begun writing your story.

Revising is an extremely important part of the writing process, and you can’t write anything well without it. Under no circumstances should you attempt to publish your first draft. It’s just a bad idea. Prepare to get good at revising. It’s a skill that’s related to writing but is, in fact, very different. It uses different “brain muscles”.

I’ll give you a strange example: I can listen to music while I write, but for some reason I’m unable to listen to music while I edit. That’s how I know it’s a skill that uses a different part of the brain. (My brain, at least.) Music is somehow conducive to writing my first draft but interferes when I try to edit.

Strange, I know. Maybe I’m just wired different.

The next point I want to make about Revisions is this: you should train yourself to make revision notes while you’re writing your first draft. I call these “notes to Future Self” or “notes to Editing Self”. When you write a revision note, you’re warning your Future Self about a problem you want them to look at during the Revisions phase (which takes place after the first draft is completed). Recognizing these problems in the moment, again, is a skill you need to develop.

Your Future Self will be very appreciative of the help, trust me.

When you write down your revision notes, each should contain the following:

The chapter, page #, paragraph (basically identifying the location of the problem as specifically as possible)
A brief description of the problem (the key word here is brief)

Examples:

Chapter 3, page 2, third paragraph
Need better description of the palace garden

Or:

Chapter 2, page six
Clean up dialogue

That’s it. Don’t linger too long on these notes. Don’t waste time trying to make them grammatically correct. If you’re in a “flow state”, stopping to give a detailed description of the problem may throw off your groove. Just note it down and keep going. Some people highlight. You can highlight a section with a specific color that only has significance to you. Either way, you should have a bunch of these when you’re finished, and they’ll make your editing life easier.

You may not catch everything when you use this tool, but you’ll catch more than you would if you didn’t.

If you wrinkle your nose at the very idea of halting your writing momentum this way, or if you try and it doesn’t work for you, then you’ll want to try this next tool:

Another way to use the Revisions section is to write a comprehensive list of problems you normally have to fix with your writing. These are bad writing habits that you struggle to overcome all the time. Write them down ahead of time in this section. Write as many problems as you possibly can—small to big. When it comes to the Revisions stage of writing, you can go down this list, point by point, to clean up your story.

Use this list with everything you write. Keep it close at hand. Add to it, but don’t subtract from it. The key is to keep it comprehensive and exhaustive.

However you decide to use this section, it should help make the revision process easier for your Future Self as possible. Revision is tough for writers, but it really is work for your Future Self, so don’t always revise in the moment, or you will surely halt your writing momentum.

This process will not eliminate your need for an actual editor.

To quote Richard Bradburn from his book Self-Editing for Self-Publishers:

If you want your book to be the best that it can be, then you will need to employ an editor at some stage, however diligently you follow the advice of this book.

I would add, “however diligently you follow the advice of any book.” This is because you are too close to your own material. A critical eye from someone who wants you to succeed is invaluable. You don’t necessarily have to employ an editor if you’re planning on going the traditional route (as all publishing houses employ editors), but it certainly wouldn’t hurt your chances of being picked up.

Clippings

Clippings is an optional section that I use to paste long passages of text. I use this during the Revisions stage (or sometimes while writing) to remove sections from my manuscript without actually deleting them.

Some writers like Orson Scott Card are fine with deleting long passages of text without blinking or looking back. (*cough* psychopaths *cough*) Not me! Every passage I’ve written, even if I no longer want them in the story, have something valuable I can learn from. I am a slow learner.

I’ve also been traumatized by having deleted long, perfectly fine passages by mistake.

Grrrr…nothing irritates me more than losing perfectly good writing forever.

So I created a section for storing things that don’t fit in my story anymore, but that allows me to reference them later on the off chance that they contain something—some element—I want, need, or that can be changed into something else. I believe it to be unwise to simply throw away hard-earned words. They’re too valuable.

Post-production

Last but most certainly not least.

By now, you should know what your story is and what it has become. Revisions allowed you to transition out of the Writer state of mind into Editor mode. Now, you have to put on your Business Hat because it’s time to find out where your story will land out there in the Great Wide Somewhere.

To be honest, I hate wearing the Business Hat. It’s my least favorite hat to wear. I’m not the only one who thinks so, either, since most writers I know would rather pay for someone else to worry about the business side of things. If you go the traditional route, this will be true. Mostly.

Still, you won’t want to ignore this tool, no matter which publishing path you’ve chosen.

Traditional Post-production

If you are planning on submitting your story to publishing houses big or small, you will have you worry about the following:

That your manuscript is formatted per publisher’s requirements
Your one-sentence logline/pitch
That you have a clear audience (you know your genre, subgenre, etc.)
You’ve crafted and revised your 600-word synopsis
You have a targeted list of literary agents (if your goal is to get an agent)
You’ve crafted and revised your query letter (see recommended reading below)
You’ve created a submission tracker (check out The Submission Grinder or Duotrope’s Submission Tracker)

I won’t go into each of these in-depth here. There are myriad of resources out in the internet, hundreds of websites and books that describe these better than I ever could. There’s no order to complete them in, but you should have them all nailed down before you start submitting.

Independent Post-production

Self-publishing or independent publishing is hard. You are basically starting a business and you won’t know how complex a business is until you start one. If you have someone to help you run your business, consider yourself blessed. If you have to do it by yourself…I wish you the best of luck. Here are some tools and advice to help you.

Keep track of everything. Have a copy-and-paste organization to track files: folders with your manuscript drafts, your proofing, your copyedits, your advance review copies (ARCs), your final edited manuscript, cover art, cover fonts, ebook and PDF print versions, and social media files.

Every time you finish a book, have a document that lists the following: title, subtitle, series name, number in series, author(s), author bio, copyright information, previous publication info, explicit content (yes/no), target audience/age group, special instructions, book description (4000-character limit; regular and KDP Upload), Series description (4000-character limit), logline (one-line sales pitch), genre(s), blurbs/quotes about book, keywords, BISAC categories, total word count, ISBN numbers for trade, ebook, and hardcover, pricing for trade, ebook, and hardcover, and release date.

How are you developing your keywords?

Keywords are used by Amazon and other online booksellers to display your book if someone searches their sites for something like your book. There’s a science to choosing your keywords, and thankfully there’s a tool out there that makes this super easy for everyone:

Publisher Rocket

Look it up. Do all the research you can about it. In the end, you’ll thank me, but you’ll thank Dave Chesson even more for his website, Kindlepreneur. Even if you don’t want anything to do with Amazon (which I totally get) I still recommend his website for all the amazing information you can find on it.

How are you formatting your book?

Hint: I recommend NOT using Microsoft Word. It was created to format office documents, not books. Some authors say they’ve successfully used Word to format their books. Fine, but there are so many better tools out there to use instead—that are meant to format books. Here are a few:

Vellum (great option for beginners)
Atticus (newcomer to the scene; still being updated but also good for beginners)
Adobe InDesign (expensive option for intermediate and experts; you can search YouTube for tutorials)

Recommended YouTube Channels

Mandi Lynn - Stone Ridge Books (@MandiLynnWrites)
Bethany Atazadeh - YA Fantasy Author (@BethanyAtazadeh)
Kindlepreneur (@Kindlepreneur)
The Creative Penn (@thecreativepenn)
Self Publishing Formula (@SelfPublishing)
Writing with Jenna Moreci (@JennaMoreci)
Abbie Emmons (@AbbieEmmons)

Bonus!

If you got this far, congratulations! I have an extra tool that I put to use with every book I outline.

In fact, this is my outline.

It’s based on K.M. Weiland’s book Creating Character Arcs, which I recommended above. It should be a part of Pre-Production, but I’ve set it apart only because I want to access it easily without having to scroll past a dozen pages to get to it.

This is essentially my book at-a-glance, a condensation of everything I did in Pre-production. The principle comes from the introduction in Weiland’s book:

Too often, character and plot are viewed as separate entities—to the point that we often pit them against each other, trying to determine which is more important. But nothing could be further from the truth. Plot and character are integral to one another. Remove either one from the equation (or even just try to approach them as if they were independent of one another), and you risk creating a story that may have awesome parts, but which will not be an awesome whole."

So, a character’s arc IS the plot. Boom. Mind = blown.

At least mine was when I read this book for the first time. I also took elements from John Truby’s Anatomy of Story and, to a lesser extent, Victoria Lynn Schmidt’s 45 Master Characters.

So I created an outline template to use and to modify for each book. Some of the plot points on this list require only one or two sentences. Some of them may require paragraphs. You can be as detailed as you’d like here, create lists of scenes if you wish. Before you use it, however, the guides for what to put in each point are found in the books by Weiland, Truby, and (optionally) Schmidt. I 100% recommend reading them first. There’s a ton of good stuff in all three.

CHARACTER’S NAME:
Arc:
Lie: “”
Want:
Truth:
Psychological Need:
Moral Need:

FIRST ACT
Hook (~1%):
Characteristic Moment(s):
The Normal World:
Inciting Event (~12%):
Refusal Action:
Key Event & Choice:
First Plot Point (~25%):

SECOND ACT
Adventure World:
Pinch Point I (~37%):
The Eye of the Storm:
Plot Revelation (~50%):
Moment of Truth:
Pinch Point II (~62%):
The Temporary Victory:
The Low Moment (~75%):

THIRD ACT
The Underworld:
Climax (~88%):
Sacrifice:
Victory/Failure:

DENOUEMENT
New Normal World (~97%):
Reversal/Reveal (~100%):

If I only have one POV character, then I’m done after I fill this out. If I have multiple POV characters, I’ll fill out one list per character, then create full Scene Sequence and order each plot point—creating my working outline. Then I will transfer each scene over to Scrivener, a powerful app I use to write my books.

As I’m writing, I’ll change/add/embellish/delete things depending on where I believe the story is going. Nothing gets lost forever. I keep everything. The story will eventually become the perfect blend of outlining (architecture) and pantsing (gardening).

Conclusion

I hope you found this useful. You don’t have to use any of these tools. You can use some of them, or you can use all of them. I like my lists, and I like having structure that I can modify and adapt to the many problems I’ll inevitably encounter on my path to perfecting my novel.