For some reason, I keep running into writers — mostly those who aren’t yet published, but sometimes ones who are — who seem to have gotten the impression that there is some sort of checklist that editors work through before they’ll buy a book. I ran into one recently who had a whole list of rules and requirements for writing a novel: it has to open with a hook, it has to have lots of action, there has to be lots of backstory (I believe this particular author felt that he should know the full details of every character’s biography from birth on, plus each person’s motivations and fears and desires [even if the character is an unnamed cab driver who shows up in all of two paragraphs in a 500-page novel], as well as everything from the historical reasons behind different building styles and foods to the daily weather forecast and why it’s wrong), the main character has to have a goal, the main character has to grow and change…there were more, but I forget them all.

And I just bet that there are people out there right now looking at this and thinking “Wait…aren’t those things that every novel needs?”

No, they aren’t.

They’re good ideas on a lot of levels; they are things that many good, well-written novels share…but you can also point to many novels, some of them classics in the field, or even literary classics, that are missing one or more of them. They’re not necessary for every single novel.

What is?

You have to tell a story.  That’s all.

It’s like making soup. There are lots of things that can go in a good soup, but about the only requirement is some sort of liquid. You can use fish, or you can use meat, or poultry, or none of the above; leftovers or fresh; one kind of thing only, or several different varieties. You can add one or two different vegetables, no vegetables, or lots of different vegetables. You can add beans or grains or pasta, or not, in several varieties at once or just one kind. You can add water, or milk, or broth, or wine, or tomato juice, or apple juice, or a mixture. You can use spices and lots of salt, or no salt at all; you can even leave out the garlic (but why would you want to?). You can make thickened cream soup or thin gruel; you can make a huge pot or a little one (but if you make a huge pot, you have to change the proportions of the spices you put in). You can puree it, strain it, or leave it all chunky. It’s still soup. But it wouldn’t be very good soup if you tried to use every spice in the kitchen, all at once (let alone every possible sort of ingredient; for one thing, some of them will make the milk curdle, which gets really disgusting).

A novel requires a story, written down in some sort of comprehensible language. Everything else is your choice.

Mind you, it’s a good idea to look at things like character growth and worldbuilding and so on, to see if the story you’re telling will be better if you add some. It’s like checking the soup to see whether it might be a good idea to add some of those extra green beans and carrots. Nothing is right for every novel or every soup. If you’re making minestrone, yup, let’s add those veggies; if you’re making vichyssoise, better not.

4 Comments
  1. Great observation. And poor novelist. If they have the life story of ever character, their book must be a bazillion pages long!

  2. I compare writing a novel to playing golf – there’s a million things you have to be aware of but not actively think of or the ball will dribble off the tee instead of sailing down the fairway to exactly where you want it to go.

    In other words, learn a whole lot then absorb into the subconscious and try not to think too much about it.

    • Chicory – Exactly: if you believe you HAVE to do all of this stuff in order to get a novel written, it’s never going to happen. Very few of us have the time or inclination to spend 40 years writing myths and legends and history and backstory and so on, the way Tolkein did.

      Alex – Pretty much. That is, you are entirely right about most of it being subconscious. I know NO writers who actually sit down and consciously figure out every last bit of plot and backstory and characterization and symbolism and etc., which is what a lot of newcomers seem to think we do. I know a LOT of writers who DO sit down and pay conscious attention to the one or two bits they personally happen to have trouble with, but those aren’t the same bits for every writer, and they tend to change as one becomes more proficient.

      The thing that you didn’t say that I think needs saying is that there are a bunch of ways other than formal learning (i.e., classes or reading how-to-write books) to get the important stuff into one’s subconscious. Chief among them is reading a lot, in a wide variety of genres. Not that I’m particularly bad-mouthing formal learning, but different people learn in different ways, and there is no one-size-fits-all for writing. (Not that you said there was; I’m just used to being explicit about this stuff, because I’ve run into SO many people who want Da Roolz or the One True Way To Write. And it just doesn’t work that way.)

  3. And as with soup, there is always the chance that whatever else you do, one ingredient will scare off your potential audience.

    _Apple juice_???

    (And I really like ‘you have to tell a story’ because for me, stories is what it’s all about.)