For the past few days, I’ve been floundering about trying to recall what on earth I did before November, when every minute of free time was dedicated to fiction-writing. Blogging, that rings a bell, but writing about what? And books, I faintly recall the voracious consumption of literature. Music, food, friends…it’s slowly coming back to me. But not quite. As my mind continues to recover from creative inundation, I’ll stick to the simple and familiar.
What makes for a good book? Everyone has different tastes and preferences, everyone has different reasons. I like personally enjoy elevated vocabulary, honesty, and raw emotion. But I believe the biggest draw to a story are its characters and their relatability.
Over the past month or so, I completed the Hunger Games trilogy, which I loved. I haven’t been a fan of young adult fiction since the highly anticipated release of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire in 2000. I’m not going to touch Harry Potter because I haven’t read any of them in nearly twelve years.
Instead, I wish to talk about the Hunger Games and the characters in my own novel. Katniss Everdeen, the protagonists in dystopian society of Panem, is fiercely and stubbornly independent and everything she does is either a reflection of that or an example of her giving in a bit. Peeta Mellark, a fellow Hunger Games contestant and potential love interest is compassionate and yielding, to the point where you come to expect this type of behavior from him. The persona of the fictional players is established early on and continually developed, the story revolves around and acts in accordance with the drive of the lead characters. The characters are developed into real and predictable, as well as relatable, people. I think an author’s ultimate triumph is reaching a point where the reader understands the characters - their fears, motivation, responses, and hope for the future. Without that, the story holds very little value for the audience.
Although the characters in my NaNoWriMo novel are nowhere near as full and developed as Katniss and Peeta, my idea all along was to build the characters and then toss them into situations to see how they react. Although the plot was scattered and inconsistent, I like to believe that what the characters say and do generally makes sense. The one aspect I was most concerned with in my story was conveying emotion, whether pity for Ainsley or disgust towards Hannah. Although the novel could use a lot of work, I feel like the characters are the biggest redeeming quality and really carried the story.
Several people have suggested I publish my novel, but I’m honestly not too impressed with it. My effort, yes. The product, not so much. I have not reread any of it, but I would estimate about a third is salvageable, content that seem relevant and publishable. But that’s still 15,000-20,000 words, far more than most people have written. And I have decently developed characters, which is a huge accomplishment.
You write very well, and I think you’re right about the novel needing some work before publishing…that said, there’s likely more of it that you’d be keeping than you might realize. It’s a beautifully engaging story, and that in itself makes it of greater quality than any length of story.
Thank, I really appreciate hearing that.
I love your writing style, as well. I’m relatively happy with the characters and the general idea, but I foresee heavy revisions. It should be fun though, with less urgency than NaNoWriMo. You might be right – some parts that feel out-of-place might be okay if I fill up holes around them and make them relevant.
From my perspective, the biggest reason I wouldn’t want to publish is I feel like it’s the same angsty growing-up drama that’s been rehashed a thousand times. But maybe the emotionality and engagement would set it apart. You know what, the fact that I’m not entirely pleased with it with means I owe it to myself to chip away at it until I am. Yours, on the other hand, is pretty darn close to publishable as it – now that’s exciting!
15,000 to 20,000 words would put it in the novella category…so no…not too shabby. Just give it a week or two to breathe and then go back in to it to self edit. Then send it out for more edits and then finish it. There is no reason at all you shouldn’t publish it. There were some real gems to be gleamed in there and your own voice and style definitely deserve to occupy some shelf or cyber space
Nicely done, Erin.
That sounds good to me! I suppose since I’ve already invest a good 100+ hours into the novel, I might as well continue to work with it. And if I think it could be better, than why not make it better? Thanks a lot, Chris!
Nothing resonates more with a reader than a fetching, well-developed character…which is to say, humans, personalities, not card-board cutouts. Emotion goes a long way to that – and hey, edit it up, but listen to what people have to say about your work. Temptation’s always to compare it to those we admire (like Collins, in your case), but we need to consider how the work stands on its own two feet.
All the best – and congrats on conquering NaNo!
I agree entirely – well-developed characters and emotions are what make a story. And thank you! It is unfair to make comparisons because everyone has their own unique approach, and if they didn’t the book probably wouldn’t be as interesting.
Very excellent topic!
just out of curiosity, how many pages was your 50,000 word nanowrimo novel?
i enjoyed it, i think your right it needs to be fleshed out, as i imagine any novel written in a month would need to be– but you have good bones to your story and that counts for quite a bit.
It came out to be about 200 pages. Actually, I’m pretty impressed with myself.
There are parts of it that I’m happy with, but others I’m ready to burn. I wasn’t planning on doing anything more with it, but maybe it a good start and something I could work with in the future. We’ll see!
How did yours total 200 pages? My story only came to about 105 pages.
I wrote mine story in an online “cloud” program, so I don’t have an actual page count. I looked online at word-to-page conversions, so the 200 is probably in book pages, rather than Word. I’m not sure though.