Tips I picked up when I met Garry Kilworth, author of such books as Spiggot's Quest and, er, others....

HOW TO WRITE A NOVEL

> There are two types of novel (or mixtures of the two)
1. Character-Driven – in which the plot is completely irrelevant but the characters drive the story on. For example, Peter Pan. The story is basically a “mish-mash” (his term, not mine) of adventures and only the familiar characters keep the story going.
2. Plot-Driven – in which the plot is the main element, and the characters aren’t particularly interesting. For example, Cinderella. The character is quite boring (she’s good, obedient, nice, sings a lot!), but the plot is a great tale of “rags to riches”.

> The first thing you need is a central idea, all the while thinking “What if?” about simple things.
- The example he gave was quite good. Driving one day, he saw a field of cows, and that got him thinking about Mad Cow Disease. ‘What if there was Mad Pigs Disease, and Mad Sheep Disease? What if there was Mad EVERYTHING Disease? What would they eat?’ And then he came up with the idea of Mammoths, defrosted from some Siberian Glazier! And since the mammoths don’t like hot weather they’d have to be farmed somewhere cold like…Scotland! So the central idea was – a mammoth farm in Scotland

> The second thing you need is a plot. The plot is very easy to come up with – just ask yourself “What are all the things that could go wrong?”
- So, using the mammoth example, he had various chapters involving Rioters against the Mammoth farm, stampedes down the M1, and various other crazy ideas.

> There are two types of plots (or mixtures of the two)
1. Hero/Quests – in which the hero has to go somewhere, or do something, or kill someone. These are the most common plots
2. Person has world come to him – for example, Tarzan. Tarzan is quite happy with his life and suddenly hunters and girls and humans arrive, throwing his world into disarray.

> Sources for creating characters –
1. Folklore (for example, goblins, trolls, hobbits, etc)
2. Legend (King Arthur, Robin Hood, Dick Turpin, etc)
3. Everyday people (Harry Potter, James Bond)
4. Or you can invent new kinds of characters (Superman, etc)

- Characters can be animals, humans, objects, gods, and ghosts. The most important thing to remember is EVERY HERO MUST HAVE A WEAKNESS, BE IT A BROKEN LEG, A GUILTY CONSCIENCE OR KRYPTONITE!!

- Also, you, the writer, must decide who is good and who is bad, as the author is the one who tells the reader. For example, Cinderella and Peter Pan’s Mister Smee are both kind, obedient, etc, but the author had told us that he is bad and she is good.