Pageturner NOVEL

Writing Tips

Because people love to talk

about books they ‘can’t put

down’ (pageturners) . . .

& books like that often become

bestsellers.

Why aim for a pageturner?

& the top 10 bestselling

authors in the U.S. earn an

average of $27 million a year.

That is a big WOW!

Writing a

pageturner

is not easy.

But, of course there’s a catch.

& Quality does not guarantee success.

Moby Dick – now a classic –

never sold out its modest

first print run (3,000 copies)

in author Herman Melville’s

lifetime

Melville’s total U.S. earnings

from Moby Dick (in his

lifetime)? $556.37

for

exam

ple

Melville is

famous now.

"Whatever you can do or dream you can,

begin it. Boldness has genius, power, and

magic in it. Begin it now.“ - Goethe

“Nothing on earth is more powerful than

talent coupled with a dream.” - Jessica

Hatchigan

On the other hand:

Amanda Hocking was a 20-

something assisted living worker

until 2010.

She wrote 17 novels in her spare

time.

In April 2010, she began self-

publishing e-books.

By March 2011, she’d sold one

million copies of 9 books, & earned

herself a $2 million publishing

contract for 4 books with St.

Martin’s Press.

An example:

But enough about other writers . . .

Let’s talk about you. & about what you need to know to write a pageturner novel.

great concept great characters

great story

Here’s what it takes to write a pageturner:

It begins with a great idea . . .

great concept great characters

great story

First you need a great idea for a book . . .

Hmmm. Now what?

It was a

dark &

stormy

night... … …

…

Hmmm. Now what?

gre

at c

on

cep

t

great concept

great characters

great story

You also need great characters

BOLD people with serious challenges

bold hero+serious challenge=suspense

& suspense glues readers to the page

What makes for great characters?

Complex, compelling, unique, and

passionate.

Put them in conflicts with others.

Have them make things happen.

Characters also need to be real: So make your characters . . .

Image Danilo Rizzuti & bk images/Freedigitalphotos.net

& make your hero . . .

HERO

Resourceful! Readers

LOVE

surprises

Along with a great concept and great characters , you need . . .

great concept great characters

great story

A great story is the 3rd key ingredient

& your great story needs a solid

structure.

How do you structure a novel-length

story?

Think scenes.

An average novel is 60,000 words

long.

That’s about 60 scenes.

(Long chapters can have up to 5 or

more scenes; shorter chapters may

have only one.)

There are two kinds of scenes . . .

Action scenes

&

Reaction scenes.

Here’s the structure of an Action

scene:

Goal (hero attempts something)

Conflict (hero struggles)

Disaster (hero is frustrated)

Here’s the structure of a Reaction

scene:

Reaction (hero “feels the pain”)

Dilemma (hero struggles)

Decision (hero has a new plan)

goal conflict disaster

reaction dilemma decision

The cycle . . .

. . . keeps repeating

Can you ‘intertwine’ two or more

scenes? Yes.

But the action / reaction dynamic is

what keep a reader turning pages.

But you also have to remember . . .

To up the stakes as you go along.

The next slide shows you how.

SECTION 2 SECTION 1 SECTION 4

Framework of a Pageturner Plot

SECTION 3

Have you found these tips helpful? If so,

you’ll find many more in Jessica

Hatchigan’s How to Write a Pageturner

Novel . . .

How to Write a Pageturner Novel (eBook)

. . . & in her ‘How Bestselling Authors

Create Pageturners’ video tutorial

(Amazon.com)

How Bestselling Authors Create Pageturners (video tutorial; 29 mins.)

Jessica Hatchigan, the author of How to Write a Pageturner Novel, has spoken and presented workshops at bookstores, libraries, universities, and writers conferences across the U.S., including the Indiana University School of Journalism, The Tattered Cover Bookstore in Denver, the J.J. Hill Business Library in Minneapolis, and the SCBWI Annual Writers Conference in L.A. Her articles have been published in Writer’s Digest, The Writer and Writer’s Market.

IMAGE CREDITS

Wikimedia Commons: Herman Melville stamp, U.S. Embassy The Hague; Herman

Melville sign, Diane Griffiths

Freedigitalphotos.net: Cats, BK Images; Goldfish & balloon, Danilo Rizzuti Flickr Creative Commons *: Amanda Hocking Poster, Joanna Penn *http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

All other images are purchased stock photos. Presentation prepared for Nostina publishing by Greenbriar Services, LLC.