Snowflake Method Step 9

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Snowflake Method Step 9: Your story, the mini version (Optional)

Recommended time: A week

Step 9 is to write a narrative summary of your novel. Using your spreadsheet you can flesh out each scene and ensure it has conflict of some kind. This should include any cool ideas, images you have in your mind. He would then print this out and use it as a ‘map’ to the story and a place to make notes. Ingermanson notes that he doesn’t do this any more, but found it useful once.

As step 10 is WRITE, then you are done when you complete this (or choose not to).

Tip: If you have the book, there is an alternate step 9. You can do this instead, or do both. I plan to do both. Ingermanson said he started each chapter on a new page. If I decide to write this longhand, I’ll probably put each scene on a page and add a fairly large margin for future notes.

Tip 2: The NaNo Prep activity this week is about managing your time. You should absolutely spend some time on this! This is an important part of setting yourself up for success. Some tips that work for me, and give you an idea:

• Look through November and plan when you can/cannot write. Then think about how you will hit your word count within those limitations. Find the little pockets of time you can use as well.

• Plan all your meals for the month. I am going to set up shopping lists on the online shopping tool I use to make this quick.

• Blitz clean the house before November starts and try to make it easy to maintain for November.

• Talk to anyone you live with about not interrupting you during writing time. I struggle to write if I keep getting interrupted.

• Plan your playlist. I am basically just going to listen to Sleep Token all month, so this was a quick step for me.

Everyone’s circumstances are different. If there is too much going on in your life (if you are, for example, in the midst of major house renovations), then NaNo will be a challenge. Even more so without any forward planning. I credit the planning as a part of the reason I finally managed to win last year. If you want more ideas and help with planning, Heart Breathings on Youtube gives very good NaNo Planning advice.