Novel Planning: Building a World, Writing a History.

Now that revisions are at play for The Murder at Mansfield Manor, I’m moving into in-depth planning for my novel focused on the Empire.

The Inspector Ambrose Mysteries gave me a chance to explore parts of the Empire, and to think about how its structures, people and groups work together. As I’ve been writing the stories these past months, I’ve also been thinking about depth. In particular, the themes and messages I’ll be looking to bring out in a novel.

Rather than racing in and beginning the writing process, I’ve taken a step back to look at history, and how the Empire fits into a long-term understanding of a society. If I can’t give a basic worldview to its characters that answers where they came from, where they’re going, and how they fix things that are “wrong”, it will be nearly impossible to build depth.

So now I’ve found myself with a sketchbook full of stories, maps, outlines and structures that will guide the first novel as it grows and develops.

But the bottom line is this: I’ve got a storyline that I believe is fun, new, and exciting.

Looking forward to getting started.