the fantasy stuff doesnt really come in till book 2, but i still want book 1 to be epic. heres what ive got so far. WARNING. ITS LONG. Prologue (12ish years before story starts): rebeccas mum is killed by enemy (the DDR). rebecca is taken by mums allies to a childrens home to grow up away from the trouble the mum caused with the DDR. chapter 1: rebecca is 15. shes in a childrens home for teens. shes bullied at school, and is always in trouble with teachers. she only has a couple of friends. childrens home staff threaten to send her to a home for mentally ill teens if she doesnt straighten out. she keeps having memories about her mum and wants to find out where she came from. chapter 2: a DDR agent (who is posing as a government official (his names Ian)) is summoned to scotland to investigate the appearance of wild wolves in the area. Ian doesnt understand why its such a serious task but he doesnt question. chapter 3: during summer holidays, the childrens home goes on a trip to scotland for a couple of weeks. the DDR agent interviews a farmer that shot a wolf that was attacking his cattle. Ian tells his troops to search the forest for any more wolves. chapter 4: rebecca sneaks off and explores the woods. she gets lost and stumbles across a den with a famished wolf mother and 1 surviving pup. the mother dies and rebecca takes the pup with her. chapter 5: rebecca manages to restore the pups health and gets it back to her home town (near london) safely. rebecca worries about school starting because she wont be able to look after the pup (which she calls Fenris). her friend Matt makes her a drink that will make her throw up so she cant go to school. chapter 6: after a week rebecca HAS to go back to school, so she hides the pup in her bag. the pup escapes in the PE changing rooms and gets discovered so she runs off and spends the rest of the day in the school library. a gang of bullies sees her and starts throwing her bag (with the pup inside) around. she is suddenly full of power and punches the main bully in the face, accidently shattering his cheekbone. she leaves the school and hides in an alleyway, distraught at what she did. the pup looks into her eyes and somehow shows her the memories of one of his ancestors. rebecca realises that theres something weird about fenris. chapter 6: she returns to school at the end of the day to meet up with her friends. however a policeman (that the school rang) spots her and confronts her. fenris attacks the policemans leg when the pm tries to take rebecca away. when the pm tries to kick fenris rebecca pushes him over, injuring him. rebecca is taken to a policestation. her dna is taken. she is forced to tell everything about fenris, and some people from a zoo take him away. chapter 7: rebeccas bullying gets worse. her friends get annoyed with her and stop being her friends. she contemplates suicide. some DDR people appear at the school and rebecca has a flashback about them and her mum. the DDR start sorting the white children from the non white children. the white children are allowed to leave but what happens to the non whites is unknown. fenris is miserable at the zoo, but slowly becomes friends with a she wolf, who teaches him how to be a wolf. chapter 8: the DDR start rising to power. however, rebecca is hunted by them even though shes white. they find her because of the dna the policeman took matches her mothers. theyve been trying to find rebecca for years, but she doesnt know why. vicky (one of the childrens home carers) diverts the DDR troops away from the childrens home and is revealed to be a Rebel (an organisation fighting against the DDR). she reveals that DDR stands for Development of a Divine Race. she tells rebecca that she must leave. she takes out a package (that the other carers kept hidden from rebecca) and gives it to rebecca, saying 'its time'. rebecca finds a black stone knife with a suede sheath and a letter from her mum. the letter tells her that rebecca must of to these coordinates which are in the middle in the black hills of south dakota. rebecca thinks that its mad. vicky tells her that the Rebels will help her along the way. rebecca says goodbye to Amy (one of her friends) but Matt decides to go with her (because hes black and is going to be caught by the DDR). chapter 8: Rebels take rebecca and Matt to the train station and go with them on a train to a port in the east (airports have been shut down). fenris escapes from the zoo when DDR people try to take him away. he follows rebecca scent and gets on the same train (in the cargo). when rebecca gets off the train shes reunited with fenris. when they reach the port there a riots where people are trying to get out of the country. chapter 9: the Rebels tell rececca that she MUST get on a cargo ship to america because its the last one and the DDR are coming. the ship is hijacked by rioters and loads of people get on. rebecca and matt manage to get on. they become friends with a few other teens and leave england forever. the ship is attacked by planes when it gets near america. rebecca and matt and a few of the new friends make it to the shore but loads of people are killed. they were meant to be picked up by rebels when the ship came into port but they are far away from that port. chapter 10: i havent really thought this chapter through but i want them to do stuff in a city. maybe they could be chased through a sewer or something. they reach a train station and get on a train which is passing north of the black hills. some homeless people on the train tell them what the DDR are doing. chapter 11: they get off the train and walk. they decide to stay off the roads and walk along a small gorge because it points south. they see a large elk herd. they are ambushed by a gang of ruffians that work for the DDR but are more violent. they have a helicopter which spooks the elk herd and fenris falls into the gorge in the scuffle. rebecca is told by her friends to save fenris. she goes into the gorge and protects fenris from the herd but gets kicked in the head in the process. she passes out. chapter 12: she wakes up in a lovely meadow and goes over to a nearby pool and sees that her reflection is a brown wolf. a woman (who can transform into an eagle) tells her that shes in the spirit world, so rebecca is dead. the woman tells her that as long as fenris is alive, everything will be ok. they walk together and become friends. then the woman (who is called Adaryn) tells rebecca about a demon she fought, but then notices that rebecca is fading. adaryn realises that rebecca is not dead. she merely spirit walked. adaryn said that only a handful of people can spirit walk, and she was one of them when she was alive. adaryn tells rebecca that she'll see her next time. chapter 13: rebecca wakes up with a REALLY bad headache. fenris is there but her friends and the ruffians are gone. rebecca wonders the woods alone and has to find shelter. she doesnt have much food or water in her bag. she tries to follow the tyre tracks out of the woods but they disappear once they reach the road. she decides that its hopeless to try and find her friends so she goes into the black hills alone. an area of the black hills is being quaranteened chapter 14: her food supply runs out completely so she has to hunt. she captures a squirrel and eats it. in the hunting scene there is lot of psychological stuff in it. she gets a phone call from one of her friends, who only has enough time to tell her the name of the place they are before the phone cuts out. rebecca tries to find the name of the place on the map but cant. chapter 15: rebecca and fenris and found by a wolf pack because they are in their territory. the wolves accept them into the pack because of fenris. rebeccas conscience goes a bit crazy. when hunting, she spots a coyote with reddish fur and red pupils killing a rabbit. the coyote runs off without eating. the rabbits pupils turn red before it dies. chapter 16: an old native american man finds rebecca. he turns out to be a shaman. he seems to know quite a bit about rebecca and he knew her mum. he tells her that adaryn can help her find her friends. he teaches her to meditate. she goes to a place in between the spirit world and our world, so its like a simulation of earth. adaryn arrives riding a giant eagle and tells rebecca to get on. they fly to the place where her friends are (which is near rapid city). it wasnt on the map because it is a DDR concentration camp. rebecca returns to earth and the shaman tells her that if she is to go there, she must get there within 3 days. he doesnt say why. he takes her to a cave then disappears. rebecca finds lots of paintings on the cave walls and finds a handprint belonging to her mum. chapter 17: rebecca tells fenris to stay with the pack but he follows her anyway. they reach the camp and are found by some Rebels, who are scouting the camp perimeter because they plan to attack it. she goes back with them to their base. chapter 18: at the base they find out that fenris has a chip in him (when the DDR tried to take him from the zoo) so thats how they kept finding rebecca so easily. they remove the chip. they tell rebecca about what her mum did to the DDR. the DDR have put hundreds of concentration camps around the country. chapter 19: the camp is just on the outside of the black hills. rebecca leaves fenris in the woods and the attack begins. matt is killed but the other friends escape. chapter 20: the others go back with the Rebels but rebecca is distraught so she goes back to the black hills and is reunited with fenris and the pack. she decides to continue going to the coordinates with the wolves. she trains herself in the process an gets into shape. she makes herself a spear. chapter 21: the pack is attacked by a cougar with reddish fur and red eyes. rebecca fights it. she kills it but gets badly scratched. one of the older wolves is killed. she burns the cougars body so it cant infect anything else. during the night, fenris touches rebecca and all the wolves in turn. they see lights in the sky (a bit lik the northern lights). one of the lights come down to earth like a pathway. they see the cougars spirit and the dead wolfs spirit rise and go up the light path into the sky. chapter 22: rebecca tries to keep her scratch wounds clean but they get infected. one of the wolves gives birth to a litter. none of them realise that they are in a quaranteened zone, and rebecca wakes up seeing the forest around them is being destroyed. she manages to get the pups to safety but decides to follow the trucks back to civilistion because her wounds could kill her. she tells fenris that he must stay and she'll be back. chapter 23: she finds a town and tells a doctor of her wounds. she warns the mayor of the town about the infected animals, and that she believes that the DDR are behind it. around this point she gets captured by i dont know how and why. this is where book 1 ends, and book 2 begins many months later. if you have gotten this far THANK YOU for taking time to read this. at one point Ian finds her and tries to shoot fenris but is killed (maybe thats why rebecca is captured because shes blamed?) ive thought a lot about book 1 but i REALLY want bit more zass in it because i think its too boring. HELP!
You have to provide the zass. That's what writing is. Any story can work and any story can fail. It's entirely up to the author. You need to make your characters interesting, give them back stories.
First, I'll assume you've never published before, if you're asking for this kind of help in the first place. So don't even think about a multi=volume story at this point. And I really mean that, don't think that way. Your first novel needs to be a stand alone, and I don't mean a first book of a series pretending to a stand alone. Publishers don;t want to hear about a series from someone begging to get their first novel published, for many reasons. And if you're holding back on story as a lead-in to the series, your first novel just won't be all you can make it. Second, it's your story. You really must work it out yourself, and you will develop details as you write. Exercise your imagination. It will serve you best if you rely wholly upon your own imagination, and not use others as a fallback. New writers go on about brainstorming. If you want to brainstorm, brainstorm techniques and approaches, not story points. Great stories are not written by a group mind, but by individuals who see things sideways relative to other folk. Trust yourself, and tell stories from within. Don't collect, masticate, and regurgitate. Create.
I honestly can't imagine anyone having the patience to read that post all the way through. While I agree with Cog's advice regarding chronicles and publishing, as a new writer you may have difficulty spontaneously generating ideas. I'm not about to do your job for you - no-one is or should be - but here are a few things you should try: - Read. This isn't about "using" other people's ideas, this is about studying the narrative process and the staples of the genre. While advanced writers are expected to add some flair, I'd consider keeping things safe for a first attempt and definitely wouldn't entertain any delusions of publishing right out of the gate. - Investigate academic studies of narrative structure: The hero's journey, the monomyth, Vladimir Propp's narrative functions and (if you have the time) the Hero of a Thousand Faces (Joseph Campbell). These all examine the common elements of the most traditional and generic (and I don't say that as an insult) storytelling motifs from ancient myth to modern day epics. - Having done both of the above, you'll realise that stories are usually more than just a string of ideas put together. I'm personally not a fan of the "just write" mentality because for the unwary this can lead to meandering. Start exploring how you want everything to come full circle - to end the arc. At around 2,000 words per chapter you should consider how you want to wrap things up, given that publishers (I believe) are reluctant to take massive manuscripts from unknown authors. If you have an end goal in mind, you can start to tailor current events to meet that end. I'm aware that some people deem that style of narrative navigation (narrigation?) formulaic or restrictive, but you can't honestly end a story without some kind of development arc or plot resolution occurring. As mentioned, a first text should be entirely self-contained. - Finally, you need to learn to summarise your points more effectively, for yourself if no-one else. You get the idea. This isn't to show other people, mind: The current style in which you summarise your story betrays a certain lack of succinctness. You've even got two chapter sixes AND two chapter eights. Get familiar with storytelling, both by reading and studying. Get your story sorted in your head. Get on with it.
guys, thank you SO much for the advice! i have decided to scrap the scotland bit and make her meet the wolf in a different and more realistic way, because i dont want to overdo the 'destiny' theme
No, I don't think you did. Because the point has nothing to do with the wolf, or even with the plot itself. It has to do with your creative process - your internal creative process, which is your individual responsibility and which we can't help you with. Go write.
best advice i heard on this was the W's Why Where What Who When return ask yourself those questions for every scene and you wont go far wrong generating idea
