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Young Writers Society


On putting writing in a novel



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Tue Mar 13, 2007 12:06 am
Manny says...



So I've gotten this idea for a story and it involves the main character coming into contact with a journal. The only problem I'm having is that I don't know how to bring the things written into the book. Do I just write out passages in chapters, write the entries as seperate chapters? What should I do?
  





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Tue Mar 13, 2007 12:32 am
Shafter says...



You can do it either way-- I'd suggest putting the journal passages in italics if they're short; but if they're really long, chapters might work better. Whichever way you choose, just make sure that it's clear when the reader is reading an entry and when he's reading the actual story.
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Tue Mar 13, 2007 12:49 am
Roaming Shadow says...



The Pendragon series basically does exactly this. The way the author does it, though I don't remember who that author was. I'd guess at least 70% of the entire book, at least the first one, is journal entries. The other 30% is two other characters between readings. Now, the journal entries are their own chapters, always. Being very long journal entries, even the entries are broken into separate chapters.

Other than this example, I pretty much agree with Shafter on this one. Just make it clear when the reading begins and the entries end. Personaly, I'm trying to figure out how to incorporate journal entries that the main character's writing as time goes by during the story. I was thinking of putting his short entries in italics at the beginning of nearly every chapter. Or at least where appropriate.

Or, if certain journal passages, you could simply summarize them, as I'm sure the reader won't need to know everything that's written verbatum. Anyway, good luck on that project.
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Tue Mar 13, 2007 1:40 am
Emerson says...



You'd think there would be a conventional way to do these kinds of things, but there never are, and that is half the fun.

No matter how you set it up, so long is makes sense both to the plot/story and to the reader than its perfect. Thats the fun thing about writing something out of the norm, it looks more original that way!
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Tue Mar 13, 2007 6:30 am
Snoink says...



One of my favorite stories is Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH. Basically, in the story there's a story being told. It's pretty neat and I would suggest you look into it. ^_^

But remember... make it easy to understand, always. I don't think there's any set way to do it, really. But in manuscript form, it's usually something like this:

Code: Select all
Blah blah blah, this is the stuff that doesn't include the journal and stuff. Then, using some nifty plot transition, the journal is introduced. The scene is breaked by using a # between the paragraphs. The # is generally centered, but as YWS will not allow me to do that, I won't.
#
Then this is the journal entry. Pretty nifty, isn't it? It goes on and on and on... and then it ends. When it does, you put another break.
#
And then the rest of the story! :D


Hope that helps!
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