I don’t partake in NaNoWriMo because as an author I
already write every day so to me every month is NaNoWriMo, but for the rest of
you writers aspiring authorship I suggest the following sure-fire method for
writing productivity and guaranteed success:
Pick a phobia, any phobia, then apply it as your
protagonist’s Wound. Regardless the chosen phobia, you now automatically have a
dominant character flaw of Fear. And from this you automatically have its
opposite virtue of Courage.
Horror: Phobia = Fear vs. Courage
Plus your protagonist has an automatic backstory
because something traumatic had to happen in order for them to get their
particular phobia.
Because every story about Fear vs. Courage is the
protagonist eventually confronting their fear, you next move to the Rubicon and
decide whether your protagonist overcomes their fear or surrenders to it.
Remember: Overcoming
the Internal Antagonist during the Rubicon by choosing virtue over flaw is what
provides the triumphant protagonist
the ability to win against the
External Antagonist during the Climax of Act 3. And surrendering to the Internal Antagonist during the Rubicon by
choosing flaw magnified over virtue is what condemns the tragic protagonist to lose
against the External Antagonist during the Climax of Act 3.
In horror stories such as this, the Internal
Antagonist is their dominant character flaw of Fear they confront at the end of
Act 2, and the External Antagonist ‘monster’ is the physical manifestation of that fear they will confront
during the Climax at the end of Act 3.
For example, as with Jaws: aquaphobic protagonist
Sheriff Brody, who almost drowned as a kid, must overcome his fear of water in
order to defeat the man-eating shark antagonist, making it the perfect ‘monster’
for that particular protagonist with that particular phobia.
Also remember: the full definition of the Inciting
Incident is that it must happen to
the protagonist, and it must present their first
awareness of the story’s central conflict, as well it must be tailored to the protagonist’s dominant
character flaw, and it must be linked
to the antagonist.
For those who enjoy partaking in NaNoWriMo I advise
using the exampled Horror Story template because it plots your story for you in
seconds flat. Phobia = Fear vs. Courage isn’t the only Horror Story template,
but it is the most common as well the easiest to plot and write.
So pick an interesting phobia, which gives you the
automatic flaw vs. virtue argument of Fear vs. Courage. Now move to the Rubicon
and decide if your protagonist overcomes or surrenders to their dominant
character flaw (I suggest flipping a coin—heads they overcome and tails they
surrender to—so you become accustomed to writing both outcomes). Now make a big
list of the worst, scariest, most traumatizing and traumatic situations you
could ever put someone in who possesses that specific phobia. Weed out the bad,
boring and predictable ideas until you have only good, exciting and
unpredictable ideas. Then rearrange your list from least intense to most
intense. Now apply your list from least intense to most intense to the plot
points of your outline from Act 1 through Act 2 to Act 3. Once you have your outline
finished, you’re done!
Repeat this process with a different phobia every day
for the first two weeks of October. After which you will have a bank of 14
horror story plot outlines. Go through them and pick the most interesting one
you want to write. Now spend every day for the last two weeks of October
perfecting your potential novel’s outline by expanding each plot point’s one
concise sentence into more detailed and multiple paragraphs until you have a guide
dog synopsis of your entire story.
Starting on November 1st, using your
synopsis guide dog and wielding a minimum daily word count goal, write your
novel for NaNoWriMo.
The rules of NaNoWriMo is to write then submit at
least 50,000 words by
Instead of shaving it so close, I suggest 29 days
of writing then spending the final day with a quick edit before your submission.
Which gives you a 1,725 daily minimum word count goal for a 50,025 word novel
(1,725 x 29 = 50,025).