the ether of ideas

"This is the first important lesson that the writer must learn. Writing a novel is gathering smoke. It's an excursion into the ether of ideas. There's no time to waste. You must work with that idea as well as you can, jotting down notes and dialogue."

- Walter Mosley, from "For Authors, Fragile Ideas Need Loving Every Day"

I feel "the ether of ideas." It is that dreamy place in the gentle quiet just before falling asleep or having just awoken, that long car ride, that booth at the back of the diner, that space between where we are and where we'll be next. Call it "the zone" or "the void" or "our inner world." In the ether thoughts and ideas float around us. Voices speak, grab hold our hand, pull us aside to whisper stories into our tender ears.

Everyone feels the ether, hears the whispers, smells the smoke. The writer is the lucky (or unlucky) fool who feels compelled to gather the smoke of those ideas and voices and write them down. They slip through the fingers so easily.

The "dream" of the novel is quick to dissolve, which is why we must write every day. And, why, even when to others it may seem as if we are doing nothing, visit that place, in the ether, amidst the smoke, as often as we may.

Novel Writing: Choosing a Method that Works Best for You by Margo L. Dill

Novel Writing: Choosing a Method that Works Best for You by Margo L. Dill

Quick and easy article by Margo L. Dill on methods for novel writing.


I've plotted out the entire book using index cards. Each color index cards represents a different type of scene. Red cards indicate major plot point scenes, purple cards represent scenes that preview the plot point scenes and heighten tension and suspense, while green index cards are scenes that move the story along to the next major plot point and provide relevant information. Blue cards are shorter scenes that focus on character development and setting, and yellow cards are contrasting scenes that depict how the characters' lives could be if they could have what they want, a glimpse of a happy life were it not for the conflict.

I've tried outlines, sticky notes, plot snake charts, chapter summaries, flow charts. I think I've hit upon a method that works for my visual learning style and allows me to rearrange scenes easily and remove or add scenes quickly to see how each effects the structure of the novel as a whole.

A friend that used to work in grocery store sales and marketing calls it my novel "plan-a-gram," after the corporate plan-a-gram charts she was made to follow for product displays. Hey, it works for me. My only complaint now is I can't use my dining table until I finish writing the book.