Before You Write

By Charles Brentner

A brief guide to help author's quickly create the background information (premise, characters, setting and plot skeleton) that they need to have in their mind at the very least before they start trying to write a full length novel. Just as every journey must have a plan so too should a novel if it is to avoid confusion. This book will help in the planning of your literary journey.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Charles Brentner
• Release date: Jan 11, 2018
• ISBN: 9781370692927

Charles Brentner

I'm a 47 yr old guy who got his 1st library card at age 3 and hasn't stopped reading since.

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A User's Guide

Dedication

This book is dedicated to my mother Penelope Brentner who put a library card 

in the hand of a three year old boy and encouraged him to use it often.

Day 1: 

Write your Premise.

This is very important. Without a premise you have no idea what you are trying to write about. The premise basically lays out the who, what, why, where, when and how of your novel.  In it you will begin to define 1) who/what your main character is, 2)where the story takes place, 3) who the antagonist(s) are, 4) the nature of the conflict, and 5) how the story will end.

1) Main Character – who or what is your main character?  A man? A woman? A child?  A elf from the northern forests of Albion?  You don’t need to have a name for your character yet, but you do need to start to nail down some basic details about who they are. If you don’t even know if they are human or an alien from Deneb 4 it will be harder to bring focus to your story.

2) Setting- While you don’t need to have every detail of your setting laid out yet you do need to know in a general sense where the story will be set. New York City?  Paris? The moon? In a medieval fantasy world? Where your story is set will have an impact on what kinds of scenes and plot twists you can have.

3) The Antagonist- Who the antagonist(s) are is very important. Your antagonist(s) must be able to really challenge the main character. Otherwise you