Ever been reading a story (or watching a TV show) and realised that something just didn’t add up?

Perhaps it was a character who travelled improbably fast (and with no access to money).

Maybe two characters inexplicably seemed to forget about their magical powers in the heat of action.

Or perhaps a hugely dramatic event, in public, went unnoticed by all the passers-by.

Whatever it was, it probably affected your immersion in the story. Suddenly, you were seeing the “joins” of the story, where things didn’t quite fit together logically.

Plot holes can be a huge headache for writers … and even if you haven’t spotted any plot holes to fix, you might be worrying that you’ve missed some altogether.

What is a Plot Hole?

A plot hole is an inconsistency, contradiction, or gap in the internal logic within a story. (If the story takes place in a fantasy/sci-fi world, the plot hole breaks the magic/science rules that have been established for that world.) It’s not a deliberate creative choice, but an accident: the author hasn’t quite thought something through. 

A small version (in film/TV) is a continuity error, where a broken item is fixed in the next shot, a background character’s hair changes colour, etc.

Sometimes, there might be a plausible explanation for the plot hole … but the author hasn’t made this clear. If characters don’t even consider the simple, logical path to their goal rather than taking a convoluted one, that’s also a plot hole.

Patching Up Plot Holes in Your Story

Once you’ve spotted plot holes, there’s always going to be a way to fix them … even if it takes quite a bit of rewriting. 

Let’s take a look at some common types of plot holes … and solutions for them.

Example #1: A Character Gets from A to B Way Too Fast

When you’re juggling different characters and different locations, it’s very easy to end up with a character getting between Location A and Location B at an improbable speed. (And if you’ve juggled some scenes around during redrafting, you might even have a character who arrives before they’ve left …)

To fix this, you have a few options:

• Extend the journey time. This is the most obvious fix, but it can often have a knock-on effect on other parts of your plot … especially if your story takes place on a tight timeline.
• Have them use a faster mode of transport. Maybe your character takes a taxi instead of two trains, regardless of the expense. Or perhaps they fly instead of driving to their destination.
• Get your characters to talk on the phone instead. If your character is only really in Location B because you need them involved in a conversation with other people there, then have the conversation take place on the phone or during a video call.
• Have a different character in the scene altogether. Perhaps you don’t actually need anyone to travel anywhere: if the travelling character isn’t that important to the scene, someone else could play their role in it.
• Use a technological/magical fix. If you’re writing science fiction or fantasy, then perhaps your character can teleport to the location, or meet characters in a virtual world or on the astral plane … whatever makes sense in your world. 

Example #2: A Character Knows Something They Shouldn’t

Another common plot hole is a character having a piece of information that they haven’t yet been told. Perhaps your protagonist has a secret that only a couple of people know … but inexplicably, the antagonist has found out. 

For your plot to work, the antagonist needs to have that information, but there’s no way the protagonist (or their friends) would actually tell them.

Again, there are a few ways to make this work. The character who needs the info could:

• Overhear a conversation. If they’re in the same physical location, perhaps they’re eavesdropping or even hiding to listen in. (This might work well if your characters are, say, at high school together.)
• Intercept a letter or message. In a historical novel, you might have characters communicating by letter or telegram across a distance – maybe someone could intercept this. Or in more modern works, perhaps the antagonist has installed spyware on your protagonist’s phone (or taken their phone from their pocket/bag, then put it back again after reading the messages).
• Guess the information. This could be a bit iffy, but depending on the info and the context, a character might be able to make a good guess at a secret – and have this confirmed by the reaction of the protagonist (or by someone else who’s privy to that information).
• Be told by a third party. Perhaps your protagonist’s best friend would never tell their enemy about that embarrassing incident at the school disco … but they’re a bit indiscreet and mention it to someone else. It ends up getting back to the antagonist.

Example #3: Something Violates the Established Rules of Your Story

In science fiction or fantasy, you might think that “anything goes” so plot holes aren’t an issue … but if anything, they can be more of a problem. The technology or magic of your world needs to operate by clear rules and have some limitations (otherwise, the whole story problem could be solved instantly).

Let’s say you’ve established the rule that magic requires a wand … but a character needs (for the plot’s sake) to perform magic after they’ve lost or broken their wand.

This can also come into play in non-SF/F stories. For instance, perhaps there’s a firm social or legal rule that you’ve established, and you need a character to break it … without the expected consequences.

In a situation like this, you could:

• Change the rules of your story. This will often require too much re-working of the rest of your novel … but if you’ve established a fairly small rule that’s making your plot tricky, you could simply change it.
• Re-establish the rule in question. The easiest fix is to keep the rule. For instance, if the rule is “magic requires a wand”, have the character obtain a temporary wand. Perhaps they borrow it from a friend, or maybe they claim on their wand insurance and get given one to use until their wand can be fixed.
• Make the rules (slightly) more flexible. Sometimes, a “rule” might not be completely fixed. For instance, perhaps it’s really difficult to do magic without a wand, but it’s possible – especially if your character has the right training, or they’re in a life-or-death situation.
• Have a character be mistaken about the rules. Maybe your protagonist (or other key character) thought that a particular rule applied … but it actually doesn’t. Perhaps it is possible to do magic without a wand, but they’ve only ever seen magic users working with wands, so they just assumed there was no other way.

Example #4: A Limitation or Detail Seems to be Forgotten

Plot holes can occur if something happens in your story that would put limits on a character, or that would affect the story in an ongoing way … but then you forget about working it in. 

This might come up if a character gets injured. Maybe a character breaks their arm in Chapter 3, but when they reappear in Chapter 7 (which takes place a few days later), they’re using both arms without any mention of the injury.

Other limitations or important details include things like:

• A character is under house arrest / has an electronic tag, so can’t leave their home (or at least can’t travel far from it).
• A character is put in after-school detention for a week.
• A character loses some important object (their phone, a key, the MacGuffin) … only to have it again a few chapters later with no explanation.
• The horrendous storm caused flooding and road closures, but your character is still able to travel, seemingly without any difficulties.

If you’ve realised that a character should be more limited than they are in the story, then you might:

• Add in some description. Perhaps your scene works fine even if your character’s arm is in a sling … you just need to mention it, so the reader doesn’t think you forgot their arm was broken.
• Remove the limitation. In some cases, just taking away the limitation works. For instance, your character is in after-school detention all week … but you need them to go straight to the mall after school on Thursday. Maybe they successfully beg to be released from detention (or new evidence comes to light that they weren’t deserving of detention in the first place).
• Lengthen the timeline. If a limitation is going to affect the ongoing story too much (e.g. no one can leave town because the main road is flooded), then you might have to have a longer time gap, so the situation can be resolved.
• Have some kind of supernatural or scientific fix. If it suits your genre, and fits with your world-building, magic or technology can fix things quickly. Perhaps your character’s leg injury is quickly sorted out by the med bay on a spaceship, or by the wizard who lives in the woods nearby.

Example #5: A Key Question in Your Story Remains Unresolved

You don’t have to tie up every loose thread in your novel … but if you’ve trailed a key unanswered question, readers are going to expect some kind of resolution or answer. If you don’t resolve it, they may feel that this was an accidental omission … and even if they think you did it on purpose, they might be disappointed or confused.

For instance, if your story opens with parents rushing to visit an ill grandmother abroad, leaving their five children home alone, then we’ll be a bit disappointed if we never hear any mention of the grandmother again. (Looking at you, The Children Who Lived in a Barn!)

If you’ve realised you’ve left something unresolved, you may want to:

• Mention it briefly in the narrative. A quick incident in the narrative can sometimes be enough to resolve the situation. Perhaps a letter arrives from the grandmother, who’s doing much better now.
• Add in some dialogue to explain things. If you don’t want to add anything extra into the narrative, a couple of lines where the characters are discussing their grandmother would reassure readers that this aspect of the plot hasn’t been entirely forgotten.
• Cut out the unresolved situation, if it’s not important enough to get a mention at/near the end of your novel. Maybe you have a minor character who runs off to join the circus: if readers are left wondering how it all worked out, perhaps it’s easier to have that character stick around at home instead.
• Include some acknowledgement of the unsolved mystery. Perhaps your characters never find out who put £50 through their door when they desperately needed it to pay rent … but they’re still discussing it, and perhaps take some greater meaning from it (e.g. that there are kind, caring people who are rooting for them).

Example #6: A Character Behaves in an Unbelievable Way

The final type of plot hole is with characterisation. If a character does something stupid, without a good enough reason, just because it fits the plot … then the reader is going to feel annoyed. 

For instance, if they enter the spooky house in the woods for no reason other than curiosity, we’ll wonder how they could be so silly!

Or if they fall out with their love interest over what’s clearly an obvious misunderstanding – that could be easily cleared up with a ten-second conversation – we’re going to find that at least somewhat ridiculous.

You may be able to justify out-of-character behaviour if you:

• Give them a plausible reason. Perhaps the action they take is vital to your story … but they need a much stronger “why” behind doing it. If they can hear what sounds like a child crying inside the spooky house in the woods, they may well run in there without a second thought (and we’ll admire them for it).
• Have them in a state of (understandably) heightened emotion. Maybe your plot requires your usually cool-headed character to lose their temper … so show why they’re so upset. Maybe what seems like an innocent misunderstanding touches on a huge trigger for them, for instance.
• Tweak their characterisation. If your rom-com needs a big misunderstanding between characters, perhaps at least one of them needs to be a little more hot-headed, or bad at backing down even when they know they’re in the wrong. Establish this early on, and the misunderstanding will be more believable.
• Establish a skill or talent earlier. Let’s say you have a scene where your character needs to step in and play the piano at a concert. This is going to seem unbelievable if you’ve never mentioned their musical ability before … but if you plant something earlier in the story, it could work. (This doesn’t even need to be explicit: e.g. just mentioning that there’s a piano in their living room could work.)

Watching Out for Plot Holes Throughout the Writing Process

Plot holes can creep in at almost any point.

You might need to look out for them as you develop your story idea and structure your novel: a little work up front can avoid the mess of a big plot hole in the middle of your story.

Often, though, plot holes are fairly small ones that creep in during the editing process. Maybe you moved a few scenes around, but now your character needs to be in two locations at once. Perhaps you adjusted when information is revealed, and now your antagonist can’t find out from their lackey in Chapter 10, because they need to know it in Chapter 8.

It can be hard to spot plot holes when you’re very familiar with your story: you might not have the distance from the work to realise that something doesn’t quite add up. This is where it’s really helpful to get beta readers involved, or to ask for feedback from writer friends. 

Plot holes can be annoying, but they’re often just part of the writing and editing process. By looking out for them (and having some potential fixes to choose from), you’ll be able to edit and polish your story so that it’s a satisfying, immersive read.

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In Writers’ Cafe, members can bring their work to live feedback hours – or post it in our dedicated feedback space at any time – to get direct feedback on their writing from me and fellow Cafe members. Whether it’s a plot hole that needs fixing, dialogue that needs a tweak, or a character who’s not quite coming across right, we’re here to help.

I hear from a lot of novelists who find it’s taking far longer than they expected to write their first novel.

They started out thinking they’d be done in a year or two – and they’ve been working on it for perhaps four, five, even ten years, without being done.

Does that sound like where you’re at right now, too?

If so, please don’t think that there’s anything wrong with you or your writing. 

Here are some likely reasons why your novel’s taking way longer than you expected at the outset … and some practical ways to speed things up.

I’ve split these reasons into two broad categories, though inevitably they overlap a bit. The first set of reasons are to do with the writing itself; the second set of reasons are more about your own energy and time.

Why the Writing Itself is Tough When You’re Working on a Novel

Reason #1: Writing a Novel is a Big, Complex Project

Some novels are inherently less complex than others. For instance, writing a novel with only one viewpoint character is generally going to be easier than juggling multiple viewpoints. Writing a contemporary novel that’s set in a town you know well (or a fictionalised version of one) is going to be easier than writing a historical novel, or one set in an unfamiliar location, where you need to do a ton of research.

But all novels are going to be big and complicated in at least some ways. When you’re writing a short story, it’s relatively easy to have the whole thing in your head … but when you’re working on a whole novel, you’ll almost certainly find that you’ve forgotten bits of it, or missed an opportunity to tie things together. (That’s where editing comes in…)

The amount of thinking, structuring, drafting, redrafting, and so on means that it can take a lot longer than you might think to put together a novel … especially if this is the first time you’ve tried writing one.

Speed it Up:

Keep good notes. You may well have to work on your novel in a stop-start way; by having clear notes on your characters and plot, you’ll find it easier to pick up where you left off. 

Consider simplifying your novel. This won’t work in all situations, but if you’ve got a complicated, multistrand plot with six different point of view (POV) characters, you might find the writing flows a lot more easily if you go for a more straightforward plot and just three POV characters.

Reason #2: Writing a Novel Isn’t Always Intuitive

If you’ve read (or watched!) a lot of stories, then you probably have a good grasp of story structure, characterisation, pacing, and so on. You know when a story feels like it’s dragging, or when a character behaves in a nonsensical way because it suits the plot … and you can (often) spot or avoid these mistakes in your own writing.

Chances are, you’ve read a bunch of writing books and blogs, too. Perhaps you’ve even taken courses on writing, or studied English literature. But even so, there’ll be times when you feel stuck on your novel.

That could be because you just don’t know what happens next in the story, which we’ll come to in a moment. Or it might be that you don’t have confidence in specific aspects of your writing – like your handling of dialogue, character descriptions, or point of view.

It’s easy to grind to a halt at these points: to put your writing down and not pick it up again because of those nagging uncertainties. Or if you are still writing, you might be doing so sporadically, without feeling like you’re really getting into the flow.

Speed it Up:

Deliberately practice specific aspects of writing. If you’re not too confident on dialogue, try writing a scene or two that are mostly dialogue. If you can, get some feedback on your writing, to get a sense of what’s working well already.

Focus on finishing the first draft. It’s very understandable to want to get everything right the first time round … but a messy, patchy first draft that makes it through to something approximating “The End” is far more helpful than a first draft that’s stalled in the middle.

Reason #3: Writing a Novel is Hard When You Don’t Know What Happens Next

Have you ever written a scene just to write something? Maybe it seemed logical to write about that journey your character needed to take, even though not much was going to happen during it, or you decided to have your characters chat over coffee. But you have the sense that your story is drifting off course.

This is what some writers call the “messy middle” or “saggy middle” of the novel. You probably knew how things should begin – with the story kicking off for your protagonist, and with all your characters coming into play. But once you’ve got all that in place, it can be tricky to know what goes next. 

This is where story structure comes in! While I’m not keen on “cookie-cutter” approaches to story writing, I do think that having big, key structural points in place is a huge help when drafting. 

Speed it Up:

Do a bit more planning. Even if you’re a “pantser” (discovery writer), it’s really hard to get through a whole novel by simply wandering around. Think about where your story is heading: what’s the big confrontation (climax) at the end?

Use my free worksheet to nail the seven main events in your plot – just pop your details in here to grab a copy:

You’ll also get my weekly newsletter and blog posts, though you can unsubscribe  at any time.

Why it’s Hard to Have the Time and Energy for Writing a Novel

Reason #1: Your Life is Already Full of Something (Without Writing a Novel)

Obviously, some writers will have busier lives than others – by which I mean, they’ll have many hours of commitments that are tricky to move or avoid.

If you work full-time, then you won’t be able to write from 9am–5pm Monday–Friday (or whatever your work hours are). If you have small children, writing from, say, 5pm–7pm is unlikely unless someone else is handling the whole of tea time, bath time, and bedtime. 

But even if you’re retired, you’ve probably got at least some demands on your time: maybe you’re heavily involved in a church or community group, you’re caring for a relative, or you’re looking after  grandchildren, for instance.

Even if, on paper, you have a lot of free time, your life is already full of something before you start writing a novel. You’re presumably not sitting around for hours each day just staring at the walls.

This means that novel-writing inevitably has to displace something else in your life. That might be relatively easy (e.g. if you usually watch three hours of T.V. each evening, you might watch two hours of T.V. and write for an hour). But for many of us, there’s not an awful lot of space for writing without giving up much-needed downtime. And that can leave you without much energy to write.

Speed it Up:

Look ahead in your calendar and block out writing time. Perhaps this month is packed … but maybe you can get a whole Saturday afternoon next month, and a full weekend in three months’ time.

Use my free Make Time to Write worksheet to figure out where writing could fit into your life. (You don’t need big chunks of time, even 10–15 minutes is enough to write.)

You’ll also get my weekly newsletter and blog posts, though you can unsubscribe at any time.

Reason #2: The Mental Load is Stopping You Focusing Easily on Your Writing

The “mental load” is the cognitive effort we all make to keep track of tasks that need to be done, anticipate tasks that are coming up, and so on. We often use the phrase to describe household/personal tasks (like remembering birthdays, buying cards, getting stamps, etc) … but work life can also have its own mental load, and a long list of work to-dos might well on your mind when you want to write.

I was chatting about this with a writer on a coaching call recently: they mentioned having a lot of household tasks on their mind, and how that was often intruding into mental space that could be used for their novel. This is such a common issue – but not one that people talk about much.

If you sit down to work on a scene in the evening, but your mind is also on the laundry that you mustn’t forget in the dryer, the work email you forgot to send earlier in the day, and the homework that you need to check up on … it’s going to be really hard to enter that imaginative world of your story.

Speed it Up:

Jot down tasks that intrude on your mind. It’s tempting to try to put things out of your mind – but I find it actually helps to pause for a second in writing, get the thought down on paper (“birthday card for Sam”), then carry on writing without worrying about forgetting it.

Do a brain dump before your writing session. Open up a blank file (or grab a sheet of paper) and write down what’s on your mind. You could do this journal-style, create a categorised list, make a mindmap, or anything that works to clear some mental space.

Reason #3: Writing a Novel (Generally) Isn’t Urgent

Unless you’re on a deadline from a publisher (or you’ve committed to self-publishing your novel by a certain date), then writing your novel probably isn’t urgent.

Let’s say you’ve planned to write 500 words today … but things have been busier than you expected. You could write those 500 words tomorrow instead, or the next day: there’s no urgency to completing them. After all, your novel may still have another 50,000+ words to go.

A lot of other tasks in life are much more time-sensitive. My kids need feeding every day at around 6–6.30pm – I definitely can’t put that off till the morning, or even for a couple of hours! Work tasks often have deadlines. Even little tasks, like replying to your friend’s WhatsApp message, or making a dentist appointment, tend to need doing within a fairly short time frame. 

Skipping one planned writing session is fine, of course (and there’ll be times when it definitely makes most sense to do so). The problem comes when, day after day, other things are always more urgent than your writing.

Speed it Up:

Put writing on the calendar. We do this in Writers’ Cafe through our near-daily writing hours, so that there is some urgency to writing: we’re only there together for an hour. Having a set time to write – and the gentle accountability of others! – makes it much more likely that you’ll get some words down.

Recognise that your writing matters. While other tasks may be more urgent, or have a visible impact, your writing is important. On New Year’s Eve, you’re unlikely to be looking back thinking how pleased you are that you were always on top of the laundry this year … having a finished novel in your hands would feel far more significant.

As you write your novel, even if it’s taking (a lot) longer than you hoped, please be kind and patient with yourself! So long as you’re still writing, you will finish. It’s okay if it takes years – most people’s first novels do. 

But you also don’t need to struggle on alone.

Novel Coaching: Get Unstuck and Reach “The End”

One of the main reasons writers come to me for one-to-one coaching is because they’re feeling stuck on their novel or they’re moving a lot more slowly than they want to. Perhaps it’s really hard to make writing a priority, or they wrote a few chapters then ran out of steam, or they’ve got a rough draft but they’re not sure how to shape it.

You can book a free call with me here so we can talk through any roadblocks that are getting in the way of you finishing your novel. There’s no obligation to go on and book further coaching if you don’t want to. This is a chance for us to get to know one another … and together, we can hopefully get you moving forward faster with your novel. 

If you’re interested, just head to that page and click the “Fill in the Booking Form” button. I’ll then get back to you with a range of times for you to choose from.

Have you got a novel idea … but you’re not quite sure where to begin?

In this article, I’ll be taking you through all the key steps for writing a novel: from your initial idea to your finished first draft.

These are:

Step #1: Come Up With an Idea You Want to Write About

Step #2: Explore Your Idea, Setting, and Characters

Step #3: Craft Your Basic Novel Outline (Structure)

Step #4: Create a Writing Plan to Get You to “The End”

Step #5: Figure Out the Perspective and Tense for Your Novel

Step #6: Write Your First Chapter (But Don’t Get Stuck There)

Step #7: Keep Writing … and Get Support Along the Way

Frequently Asked Questions About Writing a Novel

(Click any link to jump straight to that section.)

You might already have tackled some of these steps, or you might be right at the start of the process. Whatever stage you’re at, I’ve included lots of resources to help you.

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Take your novel from idea to finished manuscript with Writers’ Cafe. We’ve got monthly workshops, live writing hours, virtual writing retreats, weekly check-ins, feedback sessions, and more … all designed to get you to “The End”. 

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Step #1: Come Up With an Idea You Want to Write About

All novels begin from nothing.

Your novel will likely begin as a tiny spark: the flickering of an idea.

That idea could come in all kinds of forms. Some novelists picture a character; others are inspired by an unusual news story or a “what if” question. You might be drawn in by an artwork or a song, and find a novel idea emerging from that. Or perhaps something from your own life – your childhood, career, or an unusual experience – gives you that initial spark for your novel.

Here are just a few examples of novelists talking about where their story ideas come from:

All my seven Narnian books, and my three science-fiction books, began with seeing pictures in my head. At first they were not a story, just pictures. [The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe] all began with a picture of a Faun carrying an umbrella and parcels in a snowy wood. This picture had been in my mind since I was about sixteen. Then one day, when I was about forty, I said to myself: ‘Let’s try to make a story about it.’

– C.S. Lewis, quoted here

After moving to London, I was sitting on a delayed train back home from Manchester when suddenly I had the idea of a boy wizard who went to wizarding school. Harry Potter and Hogwarts came out of nowhere in the most physical rush of excitement, and ideas came teeming into my head. I simply knew it was something I would love to write, but that day I was pen-less for once in my life, so as I sat there on the train, I had to rely on imagining the details, most of which ended up being in the books.

– J.K. Rowling, in My Story

For me, ideas come out of themes and questions, not necessarily intellectual, and often emotional. I think about the premise of the story. For instance, what does it feel like if you reach a certain age and it dawns upon you that you’ve wasted much of your life? With experience, it becomes easier to recognize fruitful ideas.

– Kazuo Ishiguro, quoted/paraphrased here

Some ideas are compelling “what if” situations, tackled in different ways by different authors. I’ve seen several books in recent years – across several genres – built around the premise of “what if two babies were switched at birth”.

I don’t think you can force a novel idea. (You can absolutely generate ideas, but you can’t make yourself have an idea that you’re determined to commit a year or more of your life to.) Whenever I’m between novels, I feel like I’ll never have an idea that’s engaging enough for me to write a whole novel about it … but I invariably do!

Many first-time novelists, however, do have an idea already. They’ve often been carrying that idea for years or even decades, not quite ready to develop it. I developed my characters and plot for my novel Lycopolis in late 2008 … but I’d had the spark of an idea for that novel for over two years by that point. I just didn’t feel ready to write it.

Try This

#1: If you’ve already got a novel idea, write it down! See if you can encapsulate the core idea in a sentence or two. If you’ve got several ideas, choose the one you’re most excited by. 

(Don’t try to “save” your best idea for a future book – you’ll get much further tackling an idea that really grabs you than one that’s only moderately interesting for you.) 

#2: If you don’t have an idea yet, but you want to write a novel, don’t try to force yourself to come up with something. Enjoy books, art, music, anything creative … and an idea may come when you’re not expecting it. Joanna Penn also has a really helpful post on finding and capturing novel ideas, which I’ve linked to below.

Resources

Writing Tips: How To Find And Capture Ideas For Your Novel, Joanna Penn, The Creative Penn

Novel Ideas and Where to Find Them, Gina Sorell, The Novelry

Step #2: Explore Your Idea, Setting, and Characters

Once you’ve got an idea that you want to explore, you need to develop it.

(You don’t have to commit to anything at this stage, and you might want to go through the process of developing several different ideas if you’re not sure which novel you want to work on.)

You can find all kinds of plans out there for developing a novel idea – the Snowflake Method is a popular one – but in practice, most writers follow a more organic process.

When I’m at this stage with a novel, I jot down lots of notes. I used to do this in a dedicated notebook for each novel: now I tend to do it in Google Docs. I get everything out of my head and onto the page – ideas about the characters, the setting, what might happen, and so on, in whatever order it comes to me.

At this point, I also do a lot of “maybe” notes: possibly paths I may or may not take. 

This is such a fun stage of novel writing … so if you can, find the time (and place) to fully immerse yourself in it. Have an hour or two in a coffee shop with your favourite drink, or take an evening curled up in bed to scribble down all your ideas … whatever helps you feel creative and inspired. Years ago, as a teenager, I used to get through the tiny door into the eaves space of our loft room, where I could lie on my stomach and write about my ideas, undisturbed! 

As you brainstorm, you’ll hopefully start to think about what setting (when and where) makes sense for your novel, and what characters are going to be in it. 

You’ll usually have a protagonist (main character), some supporting characters, and an antagonist (not necessarily a “villain” as such, but someone who opposes the main character or gets in the way of them achieving their goal).

Try This

#1: If you get stuck when brainstorming, you might feel that you’re not sure where else to go with your ideas. When I talk to coaching clients about this, we often dig into why questions. Why would your main character finally snap and leave their marriage? Why would an organisation take on this huge vanity project?

Figuring out possible reasons can nudge you forward into more ideas, with one train of thought leading to others.

#2: Another great resource here is ChatGPT (or your AI tool of choice). Generative AI is great at reflecting things back at you and giving you prompts. Here’s a prompt you can use:

I’m brainstorming a novel, and this is what I’ve got so far. Could you ask me some specific questions to explore as I brainstorm further?

Just paste in or upload your notes with the prompt.

Resources

Writing a Fiction Novel (Part 1): How to Brainstorm Ideas and Test Your Concept, Miffy Seideman, MiffieSeideman.com

Character Name Generator, Ali Luke, Aliventures

Step #3: Craft Your Basic Novel Outline (Structure)

A lot of people treat steps 2 and 3 as the same thing … but I think they’re quite different.

Developing your idea is a highly creative, exploratory process. Crafting a novel outline tends to be more analytical: sure, you’re still thinking about different possibilities, but you’re taking a much more ordered and structured approach.

This is also a point in the novel writing process where you’ll find a couple of different approaches, often described as “plotters vs pantsers”. In practice, I think this is a slightly false dichotomy … most writers fall somewhere between the two!

But let’s take a look at these basic approaches:

Plotters are writers who outline in detail before starting their first draft. They will likely have a chapter-by-chapter outline, perhaps even an outline that digs down into individual story beats, not just a high-level novel structure.

Pantsers (“seat of the pants” writers, or “discovery” writers) just dive into drafting. They may have a vague idea of how the story should end, and a few things that might happen along the way, but mostly they’re operating by instinct alone.

For years, I was well towards the “pantser” end of that spectrum. My personal writing process was to develop an idea, know how the novel would begin and end, and to just dive in and write a scrappy first draft. I’d start over, with a fresh blank document, for the second draft.

I don’t think that’s a bad process – and it suited me well because I like to write fast! – but it’s started to feel inefficient and frustrating for me, so I’m leaning into doing considerably more upfront planning.

When I see writers getting stuck, often in their first three chapters, it’s usually because they’re taking a pantser approach. They have a clear picture of how their story begins – which carries them through those early chapters – but then they simply don’t know what happens next.

To avoid that, I recommend spending a bit of time working out the major structural points for your novel.

Those are:

• The Hook – what happens on the first page (or very close to it) to draw readers into the story?
• The Inciting Event – what breaks the status quo and kickstarts the story for your main character? (Also called the inciting incident and the call to adventure.)
• The First Plot Point – what big change pushes your main character into reacting to events?
• The Midpoint (Second Plot Point) – what major reversal happens in the middle of your story, driving your character from reaction to action?
• The Third Plot Point – what’s the “darkest hour” for your main character?
• The Climax – what big showdown happens between your protagonist and the antagonist?
• The Resolution – what’s the new status quo at the end of the story?

You can get more details on all of these, plus examples of how they play out in The Hunger Games, in my post on three act story structure.

Try This

Spend an hour outlining your novel’s plot. If you’d like a free worksheet to help with this, just pop your name and email address in below:

If you’re on the “plotter” end of the spectrum, dig deeper, if you want! You might like to plan out individual scenes (individually or in sequence), at least for the first 25% or so of your story (up to the first plot point).

Resources

Three Act Story Structure (Including the Seven Key Plot Points Your Novel Needs), Ali Luke, Aliventures

How to Outline Your Novel, K.M. Weiland, Helping Writers Become Authors

Step #4: Create a Writing Plan to Get You to “The End”

Once you’ve got an outline – even a very high-level one – you might be tempted to jump straight into drafting.

I think it’s really helpful at this stage to pause and figure out what you need to do to get to “The End” of your first draft.

Sometimes, I’ll hear from writers who feel that they need to be able to take a year’s sabbatical from work, or wait until they’ve retired, to write a novel. 

Other writers are at the other extreme: they expect to write a novel in a few months, despite a hugely demanding day job and hectic family life.

Writing a novel takes time … but it might not be as much time as you’d imagine.

This is where it’s really helpful to break things down into a plan.

Let’s say you want your first draft to be finished by the end of the year, and that’s currently 10 months away.

You might want to allow a month for extra outlining, trying out scenes, and figuring out the point of view for your novel (see step #5). 

Then, assuming your novel’s going to be about 80,000 words, you could aim to write 10,000 words a month – which gives you a bonus month in case things run over.

Once you’ve figured out how many words you need to write per month, you can work out potential ways to fit that in. For instance, for 10,000 words a month, you could decide to write:

• 330 (ish) words every day
• 450 (ish) words every weekday
• 1,100 words every Saturday and 1,100 words every Sunday

There are all kinds of writing schedules that can work for a novel. (One of the more unusual ones I’ve come across was Kazuo Ishiguro’s four-week “Crash” for writing the first draft of The Remains of the Day.)

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To get my guided worksheet (Make Time to Write) to help you build an achievable writing plan, just pop your name and email address in below:

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Try This

Track your time for a week – it’s a bit tedious, but it can be eye-opening! You can use a spreadsheet, an app (there are loads of options), or even just a notebook. After a week, you’ll hopefully be able to see patterns – e.g. perhaps you’re spending an hour scrolling on your phone most evenings, and you could use 30 minutes of that time for writing.

Consider writing alongside other people doing something creative/writing-related. Sometimes I do a co-working session like this with my husband, but mostly, I do this through the Writers’ Cafe live writing hours. I’m much more likely to fit in an hour of writing when it’s on my calendar and it’s happening alongside other writers! 

Resources

17 Ways to Make the Most of Your Writing Time, Ali Luke, Aliventures

How Do You Find the Time to Write? Joanna Penn, The Creative Penn

Step #5: Figure Out the Perspective and Tense for Your Novel 

One major decision you’ll need to make before you start the first draft is what perspective (first or third person) and tense (past or present) you’re going to use for your novel.

Sometimes, you might feel that the choice is obvious: e.g. third person past tense just “feels” right for your story.

As a very rough rule of thumb:

• First person, present tense is very immediate, often associated with YA fiction, and can lend itself to a lot of interiority (being inside the character’s head, rather than focused on what’s happening externally).
• First person, past tense gives a little bit more distance, and allows you to have a character reflecting back on events that happened in their past.
• Third person, present tense can be seen as a more literary choice – though that’s far from invariable.
• Third person, past tense is probably the most “standard” option out there across genres, and it’s unlikely to attract any hatred!

Some readers do have strong opinions about perspective and tense: you’ll find readers who only or never read first-person narratives, for instance, and some people really dislike present tense.

This may also mean figuring out what’s the norm within your genre. For instance, most current romance novels are first-person. If you’re writing a YA dystopian novel, you might lean towards using first person, present tense (that’s what The Hunger Games and Divergent use – though The Maze Runner is third-person, past tense).

Try This

#1: Write a sample scene from your story in whatever perspective and tense seems to make most sense. How does it feel? Does the writing flow or does it seem awkward or stilted?

Try changing the scene, or part of it, to a different perspective and tense. That might mean switching from third to first person, or changing from a limited third person to an omniscient perspective.

#2: ChatGPT (or your AI of choice) is also great for switching around perspective and tense. Feed in the scene you’ve written and prompt it like this:

Change this scene to [past/present tense] [first/third person]. Keep everything else exactly the same.

You’ll probably find that some sentences don’t read quite as well in the new tense/perspective, but this can give you a quick glimpse at whether you might want to experiment further with adjusting these.

Resources

Choosing the Right Viewpoint and Tense for Your Fiction [With Examples], Ali Luke, Aliventures

How to Choose the Best Point of View for Your Story, Savannah Gilbo, SavannahGilbo.com

Step #6: Write Your First Chapter (But Don’t Get Stuck There!)

At some point, you need to start the novel “proper”.

Some writers will have written bits and pieces of scenes by this stage, perhaps to get a better feel for a character – or to try out the perspective and tense, as we mentioned above.

But eventually, you need to begin on Draft One for real.

I completely understand why writers end up putting this moment off! Everything up until now may feel quite exploratory and even playful: you’re trying out ideas, jotting down notes, and the actual novel exists only in your head.

As soon as you type Chapter One and start writing, any sense of perfection is gone!

(I still remember doing this for Lycopolis, when those first few words on a blank page felt like I was trampling over pristine, freshly fallen snow, and leaving my ugly footprints everywhere.)

The thing is, your novel could exist as a perfect idea of a story in your head … but then it can’t exist in reality, for actual readers.

I’ve never read a perfect novel. I have, however, read novels that stayed with me for decades, novels that moved me to tears, novels that were a massive bright spot in an otherwise dull or difficult week, novels that made me feel braver and more compassionate. Novels that changed me.

Your first chapter will likely go through a lot of rewrites. It’s fine for it to feel inadequate to begin with – it almost certainly won’t do justice to your idea, and that’s just the nature of the writing process.

And here’s something else I want you to know: you almost certainly won’t feel ready.

Sometimes, writers wait for a sense of readiness before beginning their draft. They tell me they need to take another writing course, or spend more time developing their plot, or fill out a detailed character questionnaire … all kinds of things.

But you probably won’t ever feel completely ready to begin your draft. That’s okay! You can begin anyway.

Try This

#1: Set a start date for your novel’s first draft. Decide when (and even where) you’re going to sit down and begin the first scene. Without a firm date, it’s easy to keep putting this off.

#2: Consider beginning partway through your story, if writing the first scene feels too daunting. Some writers like to work in a patchwork way, jumping around between different parts of the story as inspiration strikes. (If you do want to do this, though, make sure you at least the seven major structural points mapped out, or you can end up with a lot of scenes that don’t seem to fit anywhere.)

Resources

How to Start a Novel: Eight Options, Plus Examples, Ali Luke, Aliventures

Fear of the Blank Page: Tips for Starting a New Novel or Story, J. Paul Roe, JPaulRoe.com

Step #7: Keep Writing … and Get Support Along the Way

Once you’ve begun your draft, it’s a bit like taking a very long walk.

You just need to keep putting one foot in front of another (or in the case of your novel, one word in front of another). Take breaks when you need them, but get moving again before you completely lose momentum.

As you write your first draft, you’ll probably realise there are things you still need to know. Perhaps:

• You struggle with writing dialogue
• You don’t yet know enough about a particular setting / profession / time period / etc
• You aren’t sure what happens in the next chapter

You’ll likely find that you need to take a step back from the actual writing to dig into these things, from time to time. But don’t let that stop you making forward progress: give yourself a limit. E.g. you might decide to read 2–3 articles about writing dialogue or listen to a podcast episode, then put what you’re learning into practice. Or you might decide to take a week to research your setting in more detail, then get on with the writing.

If there’s a particular fact you need for a scene, it’s fine to put a [note to self] to come back to it. Use square brackets, yellow highlighter, red text, the editing note “TK” … whatever makes it easy to spot in your rewrite.

Writing a whole novel draft takes time: for most first-time novelists, it takes years. (Though if you’ve followed the steps above, and you’ve got both an outline and a plan for when you’re doing the writing, you might well be done within a year.)

Try This

#1: To keep up your motivation and momentum, it’s really helpful to be supported by other writers. There are loads of ways you can do that: you might have a local writers’ group, you might want to join a writing course to meet other writers, or you could join an online community like my Writers’ Cafe.

#2: If you get stuck partway through your draft, don’t give up! It’s really normal to have “stuck” moments (and even points where you question whether it’s worth writing your novel at all). Sometimes, just taking a break can help; you might also want to get some feedback and support – I do this both through one-to-one coaching and within Writers’ Cafe.

Resources

Staying Motivated to Finish a Novel … or Even a Short Story, Ali Luke, Aliventures

How to Keep Momentum Through Long Drafts and Revisions, April Davila, AprilDavila.com

Frequently Asked Questions About Writing a Novel

I invited questions from the Aliventures newsletter readers ahead of writing this blog post … thanks to all those who sent questions in! 

These are a paraphrase of different questions asked by various people, plus questions that come up a lot from my coaching clients and in Writers’ Cafe.

Do I need to outline my novel or can I just write it by instinct and inspiration?

You don’t have to outline a novel. Most writers have taken in a whole lot of stories (not just novels, but films, short stories, fairy tales, etc) and so they have an instinctive grasp of structure. 

The problem is that if you don’t outline at all, it’ll likely take you a lot of drafts to really figure out the story, the key moments within it, and the pacing. You might be happy with that: some writers really enjoy the process of exploring a story and seeing where it goes, and they don’t mind doing a lot of rewriting and editing. 

But if you want to get to “The End” faster, spending even just an hour on outlining could make a big difference.

How do I develop the plot of my novel?

It can be tricky to figure out what should happen in your novel. Depending on your genre, you might have a more character-based novel where not a huge amount happens … or you might have a very plot-driven novel with lots of twists and turns. So a good first step is to figure out what’s the norm within the genre you’re writing in.

Beyond that, I’d recommend figuring out the major structural points in your novel (see Step #3, above). If you have some gaps or things you’re not sure about, that’s fine: you can start drafting anyway, and come back to your plan to fill those in as the story starts to become clearer in your mind.

How much research do I need to do for a historical novel?

I don’t write historical fiction, but I know several authors who do … and they all love research! They could happily get lost in the research stage for months or years.

There’s no rule about how much research you need, as it really depends on how familiar you already are with the historical period you’re writing about, how much your story relies on real historical events vs being an original story set in a historical period, and how important accuracy is for readers in your specific genre or subgenre.

I’d recommend doing enough research that you feel confident about your plot, setting, and characters, then being willing to do extra research as things crop up while you draft. If you try to research every possible detail ahead of time, you might never start drafting at all.

How can I avoid getting stuck in the middle of my novel?

The middle of your novel is a full 50% of it (from the first plot point at around 25% to the third plot point at 75%) … so it’s very easy to get bogged down here.

The biggest issue I see authors having with middles is that they don’t have a clear midpoint (this is the second plot point at the 50% mark). The midpoint is a turning point when your character moves from reaction to action, and it’s usually also a point where they realise some new truth about who they are as a person. If you don’t have that point in there, at the right stage, your middle is likely to feel saggy.

How do I weave everything together, all at once, as I write?

There’s so much to juggle when you’re drafting: characterisation, description, dialogue, plot beats, your unique writing voice … and it might seem pretty much impossible to do it all at once.

The good news: you don’t need to do it all at the same time! That’s what redrafting is for. Get your first draft down, focusing on your characters and plot: just tell the story. You can improve the dialogue, add description, refine your voice, and so on as you redraft.

Some people like to do this really fast and call it “Draft 0”. Others write a very short 10,000-word or so draft (Steff Green calls this a “skeleton draft”), with all the major plot points, and then expand it massively.

Should I write this idea or that idea?

If you’re torn between two possible novel ideas, always pick the one that excites you the most. Even if it seems harder to write. Even if you’ve already started outlining a different idea. 

Trying to write a novel that’s only moderately interesting to you just won’t work. You’ll get a few chapters in, realise how much there is still to do, and you won’t want to carry on. (If that’s where you’re at right now, please quit the boring novel and write the exciting one instead!)

Why is the drafting process taking so long?

Writing a novel is messy! Even if you’ve planned in detail ahead of time, characters might surprise you and some scenes may be really hard to write (perhaps they need a lot of research, require juggling multiple characters at once, or carry a heavy emotional weight). 

Life often gets in the way, too: perhaps you were writing steadily for a couple of weeks, then something happened to derail you – and you’ve lost momentum.

It’s very, very normal (even for experienced novelists!) for your first draft to take longer than you expect. I know how frustrating this can be, but please don’t think it’s any reflection on you or your writing.

If you’re working on a novel, whatever stage you’re at, I’d love to hear about it! You can pop a comment below or email me at ali@aliventures.com. 

A lot of writers wait for years to start on a novel because they feel like they’re not ready. They want to do more writing first, or take another course, or even get a creative writing qualification. Often, they feel they need more experience of writing: that there’s a certain level they have to reach as a writer before they can start on a novel.

The problem is, they don’t quite know what that level is.

So what experience do you need before you start writing your first novel?

My honest answer? None. You don’t need to have any specific level of writing experience.

This isn’t skydiving or rally driving or brain surgery. Even if your first attempt at a novel is a complete disaster, no-one’s going to die! It really is okay to open up a fresh document, type “Chapter 1” and go from there.

In practice, though, most first-time novelists will have had at least some experience writing fiction (or something similar, like memoir or creative nonfiction). It’s unusual for people to suddenly want to write a novel having never written anything.

A novel is a big commitment, both of time and of creative energy. So if you do feel you want some extra experience first (or if you want to double-check that the experience you already have is setting you up well for a successful novel), then here are the places I’d recommend beginning.

Writing Short Stories (Before You Write Your First Novel)

There’s a good chance you might already have written some short stories, but if not, they’re a brilliant place to begin.

Short stories are fantastic for getting to grips with things like story structure, setting, characterisation, and all the different elements of storytelling: dialogue, description, action, and so on.

For me, one of the most helpful aspects of short stories is that they let you try your hand at different writing styles and genres, without committing to spending very long on any one piece: you could write a short story in a week, or potentially even in a day.

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For a clear, structured guide to short story writing, check out Zero to Story. It’s a three-week self-study course that explains the key elements of fiction step-by-step (with practical exercises), then takes you through a guided process of writing a piece of flash fiction, then a short story. Everything you learn during the course will also put you in a great position for writing a novel.

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To get started quickly with short stories, you could:

• Read a few contemporary short stories: try magazines, literary journals, and/or competitions’ previous prize winners. Pay attention to what grabs your attention and what sticks with you.
• Look at short story competitions for ideas and themes to try out. You don’t have to enter the competitions, if you don’t feel ready … you can just use them for inspiration.
• Get 20 free writing prompts (each with a word, image, and some thoughts about directions you could go in) by entering your name and email address below.

Building a Writing Habit (Before You Write Your First Novel)

You could write a short story during a quiet weekend … but a novel requires a significant amount of time and focus, often over months or even years.

Don’t let that put you off starting (when you look back in a year’s time, you’ll be glad you did!) … but do think about what you can do, even before you start your novel, to develop a solid writing habit or routine.

There are probably as many different writing routines out there as there are different writers, but some things you might like to try are:

• Writing every day, just for a few minutes. Even five minutes a day will add up to a chapter or more each month. If you’re going for a daily writing streak, keep your target very small, so that it’s achievable even on your busiest days. You can always do longer sessions on days that are less hectic.
• Blocking out specific writing sessions on your calendar. You can either stick to the same times each week (e.g. 30 minutes during your lunch breaks Monday to Thursday, and an hour each Sunday afternoon) or you can choose these for each week, ideally at the start of the week. In Writers’ Cafe, we run a live writing hour almost every day: this makes it easy to put writing on your calendar and have focused writing time.
• Writing away from home – especially if this means you can avoid a lot of interruptions and distractions! Plenty of writers find it tough to focus when at home. If you have kids who constantly interrupt (or a partner who does likewise!) then getting out to a local coffee shop or library could make it so much easier to have an hour to write in peace. Similarly, if you find it hard to settle to writing because there’s always laundry/dishes/etc, leaving it all behind at home can make it a lot easier to get that creative headspace you need.
• Taking an occasional writing retreat. I love to book a hotel at least a couple of times a year so I can get away and write, uninterrupted for hours at a stretch! That might not be practical for you to do very often (or at all) … an “at home” retreat is a great option too. This means setting aside at least half a day, ideally a full day, well in advance so you can just focus on writing. Each month in Writers’ Cafe, we have a virtual writing retreat together: a great way to make serious progress.

Writing short stories (or anything!) and having a strong writing habit is enough to set you up for writing a novel.

By all means, read some books or take some courses if you enjoy those – but remember you don’t need to do lots of courses or have any special qualifications to write a novel.

Yes, it’s helpful to understand basic three-act story structure, to choose the right viewpoint and tense for your novel, to know how to write realistic dialogue … but most of this is best learned while actually doing it! If there’s an area you’re not sure about or struggling with as you work on your novel, then look for a book, blog post, podcast episode, or short course that tackles that specific aspect of writing.

Best of luck with your novel … I’ll be rooting for you!

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If you’d like personal support from me, and from other novelists (both brand new and more experienced), check out Writers’ Cafe and get on the waiting list.

We’ll be reopening in March 2026 for new members, and we’d love to have you with us. Everything we do is designed to help you go from initial idea to finished novel: we’ve got live writing hours, virtual day-long retreats, monthly workshops, weekly accountability check-ins, regular feedback sessions, and much more. You can join in with as much as you like, or dip in and out as needed.

Should you get your first draft down as fast as possible … or take more time over it?

My own writing process has always been to draft fast (I can easily hit 1,000 words in an hour, often in 45 minutes) and then to restart with a blank document for Draft Two … but increasingly, I feel this isn’t serving me so well!

If like me, you’re finding yourself getting bogged down at points in your first draft, or writing scenes for the sake of writing, without really knowing how it’s all going to fit together, then you might want to do more structuring upfront and potentially even write more slowly as you draft.

I was really interested to hear Savannah Gilbo talking about this in episode 224 of her podcast, The Truth About Writing Faster: It’s Not What You Think. In particular, she mentioned that a number of writers she’s worked with have slowed down their writing pace, but finished novels more quickly … because they’re not getting stuck and they’re doing much less editing.

Should You Write Fast or Slow?

What matters is that you write, you enjoy the process, and you finish something! You can go as fast or as slow as you like.

It doesn’t really matter if you like to type at a breakneck pace (then edit a lot) or thoughtfully consider each sentence as you write (then do minimal editing). So long as you’re having fun and you’re getting your novel closer to “the end”, that’s great.

But if you feel like your current process isn’t quite working, then here’s how to experiment with changing things.

How to Speed Up if You’re Writing Slowly (But Overthinking Everything)

If you feel like your writing is too slow, it could be because of one of these very common issues during the planning, drafting, or editing stages:

• You’re spending months on research, reading book after book, article after article, making notes, taking virtual walks on Google Maps … but not getting any closer to actually starting writing your novel.
• You’re meticulously working out all the details of your story before you begin writing … but as soon as you start drafting, you realise that you want to change your plan. Or, you don’t start at all because you’re feeling bored of your story already.
• You’re getting stuck writing and rewriting the first three chapters, because you don’t know what happens next.

The solution for each of these is different. Let’s take a look at each in turn.

#1: Spending Forever Researching

If you’re stuck in research mode, give yourself a firm deadline to stop researching. Then, come up with a high-level outline for your novel, if you don’t already have one, and start on the drafting.

There might be times when you realise you need to know something critical for a scene. If it only affects one scene, I’d put in a “note to self” (as a comment, in square brackets, or in yellow highlighter) and come back to it at the editing stage. If this detail is going to have a knock-on effect on other scenes, that’s when it’s worth pausing and going a bit of extra research.

#2: Getting Stuck on Outlining

Some novelists like to do a ton of planning upfront, and that can make a lot of sense if you’re in a genre with twisty turny plots (like murder mysteries, for instance). But many writers feel that if they do too much planning, it takes away some of the enjoyment of writing. Doing very detailed outlines can also be unhelpful if you begin drafting then realise that what you’ve planned doesn’t fit your characters at all.

As with researching, I’d have a deadline for the outline. I’d also keep it fairly high-level for the most part: know your key plot points, but don’t feel that you need to plan out what happens in every single chapter right up to the end of the book. (It’s usually helpful to plan at least the first 5–7 chapters, then you can keep pausing and planning the next few chapters as you draft.)

#3: Endlessly Rewriting the First Three Chapters

This is probably the biggest issue I see keeping writers stuck! You keep reworking the first three chapters (or maybe even just the first chapter) because (a) you want to get it right and/or (b) you don’t know what happens next.

It’s hard, but the best thing you can do here is simply move on! Write notes to yourself about what you want to change in Chapters One, Two, and Three when you come back to them. Spend some time outlining the broad strokes of the rest of the book, so you know what you’re heading towards.

How to Slow Down if You’re Writing Fast (But Editing a Lot)

Maybe you’ve got the opposite problem. You’re writing fast – maybe thousands of words a week – but then you’re ending up with problems like:

• You’re writing at breakneck speed for a week or two … then you’re hitting a wall. You feel like you’ve run out of inspiration. It might be weeks or even months before you pick up your novel and start working on it again.
• You’re finding yourself with a much longer first draft than you want. Perhaps you have 150,000 words when 80,000 is normal for your genre. It’s not just that you need to cut out some big chunks … every single scene feels too wordy.
• You’re cutting out huge chunks of your first draft as you revise. Whole chapters that go nowhere, characters who don’t fit, meandering passages where your scenes are sagging … there’s just so much that needs to go.

If you’re running into problems because you’re going too fast, that’s usually because of one key problem: you don’t really know what’s happening in your plot.

You might have started off your novel with a clear picture of your main character, the situation that draws them into the story (the inciting event), and where it’s all going to end up (the climax/resolution) … but there’s an awful lot of “middle” that feels vague and fuzzy!

It can be fun to just write and see where the story takes you, but that can easily lead to the problems above: you lose momentum, you write far too much, and you have lots of bits of the first draft that need to go completely.

If you’re happy with that process – that’s fine! You can write a fast, scrappy first draft and completely start over from scratch, once you’ve figured out the story through writing it.

But if you feel that this process isn’t working well for you, then you might want to try one or more of these:

#1: Spend More Time Outlining Before You Write

Taking just a few days or a week to outline your novel before you start writing could make a massive difference to the quality of your first draft. You might spot issues (or clever connections!) at the outlining stage that wouldn’t have been obvious until you were a long way into a draft.

Pop your email address in below to get a free copy of my “Novel Structure” template, which helps you create a simple, high-level outline that covers all seven of your crucial plot points:

You can also read my post on Three Act Story Structure which goes along with the worksheet.

#2: Don’t Write Just for the Sake of Writing

I know how easy it is to want to write something on your novel – and again, this is fine if it works for you. But personally, I’ve found that when I’m chasing a daily word count goal, it’s all too easy to end up writing a scene that doesn’t really go anywhere, or doesn’t necessarily fit in with the broader plot of my novel.

Try to avoid writing just because you feel you should get some words down. Instead, think about what scenes are going to build naturally towards your next plot point. If you don’t know what the next plot point is, take a step back from writing and do some more planning.

#3: Consider Slowing Down Your Actual Writing

I’m a fast typer and I like to get sentences down quickly. But when I did my Masters degree in creative writing, I had a number of classmates who took a very different approach – they took care over each sentence, writing a lot more slowly, but also doing a lot less redrafting and editing than I did! 

There are also writers who go a lot faster than me by using dictation software, but I’ve heard them say that this super-fast drafting does end up requiring more editing afterwards.

It’s hard to get an inside look at other writers’ creative process – the actual mechanics of how they draft and edit – without being in some sort of feedback group, but you can absolutely experiment with your own writing. Try deliberately slowing down, and see whether you’re happier (or not!) with the results.

Whatever stage you’re at with your writing, and whether you’re a naturally fast or slow writer, I hope that you can have lots of fun along the way. Next time you sit down to write, try tweaking your process just a little: maybe spend a few minutes doing some upfront planning of your scene, or write a paragraph or two much more slowly than usual.

Free Novel Structure Worksheet

Don’t forget to grab your free copy of the Novel Structure worksheet. This helps you map out all seven of your key plot points on one page, with guidance on what needs to happen at each one. Just pop your email address in below:

Happy New Year! We’re just over a week into 2026 … and there’s a good chance you’ve been thinking about your writing, and what goals you might want to set for the year.

I’d love to hear what you’re working on: just pop a comment below (or if you prefer, drop me an email at ali@aliventures.com). Whether you’re developing a regular writing habit, entering short story competitions, trying a new form/genre, or writing a full novel, I’d be thrilled to cheer you on. 🙂 

My Writing Goals for 2026

I’m taking a slightly different approach to some of my goals this year (I’m trying to follow my own advice to stick to one big project at a time)!

So in 2026, I’ll be tackling:

Big Fiction Project: Finish My Rom Com Novel and Send Out to Agents

In the second half of 2026, I drafted a rom com novel (a new genre for me to write, but one I’ve been really enjoying as a reader recently). My big goal for 2026 is to finish this and send it out to agents. 

While my self-published novels are contemporary fantasy, I discovered when sending Reaper around to agents last year that there just aren’t many agents in the UK who represent fantasy fiction. So I’m interested to try something more mainstream and see how it goes!

How I’m Making it Happen

Any big project needs a decent amount of time and focus, so I’ll be:

• Blocking out chunks of time each week for writing, on my calendar – much of this will be during the Writers’ Cafe writing hour slots.
• Taking one “at home” writing retreat each month – again, this is something I’m doing as part of Writers’ Cafe.
• Deliberately making time to step back and brainstorm or rethink plot elements as I redraft. It’s always tempting to rush forward when a scene feels “good enough”, but I want to make this novel as strong as I can.

I’m hoping to keep up the momentum and get the novel finished in the first few months of 2026: if so, I’ll then choose another big project to focus on for the rest of the year.

Other Fiction Projects: Short Stories, Reaper, and a Writing Streak

This year, I’ll also be working on:

Publishing Reaper

I sent my contemporary fantasy novel Reaper to five agents last year (it was hard to find agents in the UK who were open for submissions and who were willing to represent fantasy). None responded positively, so I’ve reverted to the original plan of self-publishing Reaper.

There’s not much left to do (a final proofread of the manuscript, commissioning a cover design, then formatting & uploading the book to Amazon) so I’m hoping to block out a day or two to work on Reaper, then get it out into the world!

Writing Four Short Stories

Short stories are a great change of pace from novel-writing … and it’s always satisfying to be able to finish something and send it out! 

My January Writing Magazine subscription came with their annual competition guide, so I’ll be going through that and finding at least four competitions that I want to enter throughout the year.

Maintaining A (Very Easy) Writing Streak

In previous years, I’ve tried for a 500 word/day or 250 word/day writing streak, but this often ends up with me too focused on drafting new material… at the expense of all the other stages of the writing process.

This year, I’m going for the easiest writing streak possible – writing something every single day, even if it’s just a sentence. (This idea is sometimes called “no zero days”). 

Obviously, most days I’m writing more than a sentence (I’m aiming for a minimum of 5 minutes of fiction writing, which usually nets me 100+ words), but even a sentence counts!

Non-Fiction: Aliventures Blog, Newsletter … and More!

As with previous years, I’m aiming to keep up a rhythm of publishing one Aliventures blog post and one newsletter every week. If there’s a topic or question you’d like to see me cover, just let me know.

I also want 2026 to be the year where I try out new mediums! I’m most comfortable writing … but a lot of the online content I consume is now in the form of podcasts and social media posts. The same might be true for you. (If so, thank you for continuing to read the Aliventures blog!) 

You can find my fledgling Instagram account here.

And my LinkedIn account is here.

And I’ll also be putting out some YouTube videos soon, plus maybe a podcast later in the year.

What have you got planned for 2026? Is there a big writing project you’re focusing on? Would a writing habit or writing streak suit you? I’d love to hear from you, either in the comments below or by email to ali@aliventures.com.

Whatever projects you’re tackling – I hope 2026 is a fantastic year for you!