Just a bit of a nosey question really - does everyone here who is in the middle of writing a novel know how their story ends? Do you have a rough idea, a precise idea or no idea at all?

I always plan the novel out before I begin, but yes, this can be subject to change. I think it's best to have a rough 'road map', but I accept that everyone is different.

JB

It's strange, I didn't plot my novel to the end but I got a very clear picture one morning, just as I was in that semi-sleep state, of my main character. I just knew it had to be the final image in my story, it just felt right.

I'd never experienced that before with my writing and to have something come to me, almost unbidden, felt very special.

L

On the whole I have to 'see' the beginning point - a person in a place - and the end point, before I can start planning and then writing the journey from one to the other. But by 'end' I mean where the characters end up emotionally, not necessarily physically.

Though one of my current MC's was real, and does end up dead, so there's not much puzzlement about that.

Emma

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Which is a way of saying, I think I'm probably like PantsonFire on this one.

I get those visions too - and then usually have to think of a way to incorporate them into a story!

JB

I always know pretty much where my novels will end. In fact I wrote the last section of the current one when I was only half way through, because it delivered itself up whole and I knew that had to be, as Pantsonfire says, the last image.

The trouble I tend to have is that I have a very strong and definite start and a strong and well mapped end with several key points inbetween. The real trouble begins when I have to join them all together.

Geoff

The real trouble begins when I have to join them all together.

I guess that's the bit that's called writing a novel.

Actually, it's true for me too. Sometimes, just before the moment of writing 'Chapter One' at the top of page one, I'm overwhelmed with indignation and bafflement 'You mean you need me to actually write it down? One word after the other? All the way to the end? But I know what happens, and who tells the story, and how. Why do you need me to write it down?'

Emma

Hi,

I know everything about my novel from beginning to last paragraph. I know all the characters, what will happen to them all, their little traits, what events are going to happen when, in fact everything. I have done all the research I needed to do and can play the story out in my mind like watching a film.

The only bit left, is to get it written down, and for me that's the hardest bit.

Katerina

I knew exactly how this book started and i know exactly how it is going to end...it's the bits in the middle that get cut/twist unexpectedly/need the most work and imagination.

Casey

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If i can be nosey...why do you ask, Charlotte? Are you struggling? I had no idea how my first novel was going to end which is probably why the first 4 chapters of it came to nearly 90,000 words...i was never quite sure when to end anything.

Not struggling really, I'm just always fascinated by other people's processes. I was thinking about the ending of my book and I've realised that whenever I finish a major 'section' of the story, the ending seems to change a little bit. Not hugely, the same basic stuff happens (my leading female dies basically) but the events surrounding her death change slightly.

There was a character, for example, who I knew nothing about until he suddenly walked into the story and he's opened a whole can of worms, so to speak. So he's now going to feature heavily in the ending, but I didn't even know he existed until about quarter of the way through the writing.

It's so strange when the book takes on a life of its own!

But exciting! It always amazes me how unexpected events naturally seem to fall into place and how sometimes the story takes shape by itself. If only it would write itself as well

Casey

I have done all the research I needed to do and can play the story out in my mind like watching a film.

I do that too Katerina! I have to direct every scene in my head and get an idea for how the characters will move and gesture before I can write it down.

Hey, that's great. It's nice to know someone else works in the same way as me. It's really weird, because I know my characters as if they were real people, and will find myself thinking xxx wouldn't have said that or what would yyy do.

Guess you have to be slighly mad to be a writer.

Katerina x

I have to confess I'm getting a bit bored with writing the middle of my novel....eeek! I think I'm going to try to write the ending next, just to see if it helps re-ignite my interest.

It's a really bad sign when you start getting bored isn't it? Gulp...