Filing Off the Serial Number

No, this is not a post about how to hide the fact that your car is stolen. Among fan-fiction writers, the expression ‘filing off the serial number’ refers to the act of removing all references from a fan-fiction story and turn it into an original one which you can then publish or sell.

 

I’ve decided to turn two stories I’ve plotted out - and in one case written completely - as fan fiction into original ones. One, already written, is “The Lady of the Dead” which is based on the “Johannes Cabal” series. The other, “On An Adventure”, is set in a possible future of the world of the web comic “Girl Genius”. Both of them, however, share little with the original intellectual property they come from.

“The Lady of the Dead” is, theoretically, featuring two granddaughters of Horst Cabal, Johannes’ older brother, but is set in a time shortly before the actual series (the setting of the series encompasses elements from late Victorian times through to the 1950s).

“On An Adventure” is set in a time after the events of “Girl Genius”, as two of the characters are descendants (at least great-grandsons) of characters to be found in the series. While the setting - and especially the Steampunkesque technology, which plays a large role in the web series - remains similar, I am not using any real characters and the references to specific families can be removed. As only one story of “On An Adventure” is written already and five are not, changes can be made easily before I commit to the stories.

In case you also want to do that - as others have already done with great success (“Fifty Shades of Grey” started its life as a “Twilight” fan fiction, for instance) -, here are my suggestions for what to consider and what to do if you want to file off a serial number and turn a fan-fiction story into something that will work on its own.

 

The very first step here is to ask yourself if you really, really, really want to do that. It’s a very long and very challenging process and it might sometimes be faster to write a new story with the same plot points, but with original characters in an original setting.

If your fan fiction is set in an alternate world (an AU, as fan-fiction writers call it), chances are you will already have an original setting and you might already have made quite some changes to the characters, too. Yet, you are still relying on the audience to be aware of the characters and their background and the general plot beats of the original story. All of this will no longer exist, once that serial number is off.

If your fan fiction is very close to the original setting, on the other hand, if you add scenes or an additional story to what is canon, then it will take a lot of work to break away from all of that and make it something original.

Don’t forget that, in both cases, your new audience will have no reference for anything which happens - setting, characters, and back story will have to be explained again because they’re not part of a known intellectual property any longer. Instead, you will have to provide them.

If this sounds like an awful lot of work, that’s because it is. It will in many cases probably be easier to write a new story, drawing on the plot points of the story you want to transform, than to turn this finished fan-fiction story into something original.

At this point, ask yourself if it’s worth it - if you believe enough in your stories to invest that time. I do believe in both of my stories or I wouldn’t do it.

 

Once you have decided to file off the serial number, the next step is to go through your story, as you would during a content edit, and mark every reference to the original you worked off in a strong colour like red - names, specific expressions, references to the canon stories, whatever is connected to the intellectual property you worked with. All of this will have to go. After you did that once, do it again - trust me, you’re always missing something on the first time through.

After you’ve marked everything and have an idea of what you need to replace (a lot, normally), the next step is to figure out what to replace it with. Names are usually the slightest of your problems - everyone can come up with new names. Other expressions are similar to that. Background information like the characters’ back stories or the history of your setting are much harder to do. Worldbuilding is always challenging. Now, if you have an AU, worldbuilding will already be done and things will be a little easier.

Another thing you need to think about is how to convey all that new information. In a fan fiction, you can assume that the audience knows about all those things - because people usually don’t read a fan-fiction story unless they’re familiar with the original intellectual property. With your own story, you need to give people all the information about the world they need to understand everything happening.

For instance, “On An Adventure” starts with Maria, one main character, having the choice between two suitors from the same powerful clan - in the fan fiction, those are descendants from the Heterodyne and Wulfenbach families (yes, I ship Agatha and Gil, if only because it would drive Gil’s father bonkers) which play a major role in the web series. I can no longer use those, so I will need to fit in something about the past of the world and how those two houses rose to power. I need to recreate the background for all of my main characters, because they’re all related to important families of the “Girl Genius” web series.

On the other hand, “The Lady of the Dead” has a few references to Horst Cabal and his nature as a partially-healed vampire. These will be easy to remove and play no large role in the narrative. I can simply ‘invent’ another daywalker or suchlike. Apart from that, because of the changed setting and timeline, “The Lady of the Dead” is pretty original already. There are names to change, there are some small changes in the narrative, but the story of Joanna and Alice (who used to be Johanna and Alisha - since the name ‘Horst’ has no female version) can play out very much the same way without serious exposition dumps.

 

Filing off the serial numbers can be a step from the world of fan fiction into the world of a professional author, even if that author might still be self-publishing. Yet, do remember that filing off the serial number is only one part of the process of publishing your own work. Once the story is completely free of other people’s content, it still needs serious editing and revising before it can be put out for all to see - and read.

Thinking in Scenes

As I have begun to plot more and more in my writing, I’ve also begun to think more and more in scenes when I do so. I could simply write down a synopsis for the whole story - that’s usually what I had in mind when writing as a discovery writer. I could also work in full chapters, as I did for a while on the way from discovery writing to plotting. Thinking in scenes, however, is the most natural way to do it. It’s also very easy to do in Scrivener, as you can use a different document for every scene, so they’re easy to move back and forth when you feel you have to.

 

In any story, no matter how long or short, the scene is the smallest unit of storytelling. A paragraph will not recount a full situation in most cases - unless it is a scene in itself -, but the scene, no matter how long or short, will add to the plot and through it to the story. Nothing below a scene will do that and every story needs to have scenes to work as a story. Even micro-stories and flash-fiction, texts which rarely pass the 500-words mark, need at least one scene.

 

I started to plot in scenes and not chapters when I switched to Campfire Pro. Even though I’ve now discarded the software again (it corrupted several of my files, having me close to a heart attack when all scenes were suddenly mixed-up or seemed to have disappeared on me), the way of plotting has stayed with me.

Plotting in scenes means plotting in things which happen. You start with the beginning of your story and you add to it. If the main character does this in scene one, what is the logical thing for them to do in scene two? If this happens in scene six, then what should be happening in scene seven and eight? During the plotting process, the scenes are your step stones. You step on one, then you look for the next one in the right direction you can reach and skip to that.

In Campfire Pro, I did that through ‘events’ in the ‘timeline’ tab. I lined up my events and worked my way from the beginning of a story to the end. In Scrivener, that is even easier for me, because every scene is its own document and I can move those documents back and forth all I want. So I fill out my scenes, I go from one thing to the next, figuring out what should happen in the next scene.

Through the scenes, I see the way the story is going, so I can change things before I sit down to write it all when I’m not happy with that direction. I can correct the course of a story without having to rewrite a lot of it, because it is not yet written. I only look at the synopsises of the scenes.

That doesn’t mean, of course, that no changes can be made later, but it helps with keeping the plot moving and making sure things stay on course.

 

Every scene has to do at least one of two things: it has to either further the plot or it has to deepen our understanding of the characters. Ideally, a scene would do both, but that’s not always feasible.

Furthering the plot usually happens in scenes where actions are taken and things move along. The detective learns something about the case. The spy finds out where the MacGuffin is kept. The lovers meet for the first time and fall in love immediately.

Alternately, the character’s personal plot arc is added to, the audience learns something new about them. Perhaps they meet an old acquaintance who mentions something they need to overcome. Perhaps they find themselves in a situation where a fear they have been unable to conquer so far surfaces. Your detective annoys an important witness by being too aggressive. Your spy can’t get to the MacGuffin, because they’re afraid of the guard dogs. Your romantic heroine doesn’t dare to talk to the love interest because she’s lacking confidence.

Ideally, the scene would further both a general plot and the character’s arc, but that is not always possible. Your detective overcomes their aggressive tendencies and thus learns something important about the crime. Your spy manages to outsmart the guard dogs and gets away with the MacGuffin. Your romantic heroine takes heart and speaks to the love interest, who immediately shows interest in her as well.

As long as a scene does one of the above, it should stay in the story. When you look at a scene and ask yourself ‘what is happening there that is important to the story?’ and don’t find an answer, the scene should be cut. Of course, the importance of a scene for the story doesn’t have to be obvious immediately to the audience, but it should become clear in time that it was important. Foreshadowing is a thing, after all.

 

Scrivener comes with a lot of tools to help you think in scenes. The corkboard and outliner modes are especially meant for helping you plot.

The corkboard mode shows all documents below the one you’re in as cards on a corkboard. The synopsis of a document is shown on the card and, if you give labels to your documents (like marking point-of-view characters for scenes), you can also see which label is given to which document. That makes it easy to follow the story, see where it leads. It’s also easy to move scenes in this view by clicking and dragging the card in question to a new space. Like this, you can move the scenes until you’re certain your story will run well that way. If you feel you need an additional scene somewhere, make a new card, put the synopsis (an a possible label) on it, and click and drag it where it needs to go.

The outliner mode can tell you a lot of things, depending on what you make visible in the list, such as word-count, label, or status. When you make sure all synopsises in the document are visible, though, it’s also the easiest way to read the description of your story so far. Again, this can help very much with seeing where the story is lacking and might need another scene or two or whether a certain scene should be moved to an earlier or later space in the timeline of the story.

These modes help immensely with thinking in scenes, as they make the story very visible from the plotted scenes alone.

 

Learn to think in scenes, you will not regret it! Once you’re able to break down the story you want to write into the different things which will be happening, it’s much easier to both plot and write it. If you plot in scenes, it’s also much easier to see early on whether a scene is lacking or missing, so you can correct that before it becomes a case of heavy rewrites.

Pacing Yourself

Last week, I wore about tension and I mentioned that you can’t keep tension at its highest all the time, that you need to give your audience time to relax a little after high-tension, high-stakes scenes. The same, however, goes for you as well. You need time to relax and recover when you’re writing, in order to be able to keep it up long-term.

When you’re creative, there will always be times of high creativity, where the new ideas bubble up constantly and you want to work all the time on the stuff you’re thinking about, no matter whether you’re a writer, a painter, or a composer. Yet, there’s also a good reason not to dive head-first into the newest project and ignore all creature comforts or other things in your life.

 

It’s both easy to work too hard and to be too lazy when you’re self-employed. There’s no boss who tells you to work harder when you’re slacking off or a contractual number of hours you need to work before going home. When you’re self-employed, you often work from home, so there’s not even a physical distance between your workplace and your home.

Therefore, it’s of great importance for you to learn how to pace yourself, both to avoid slacking off without a boss breathing down your neck and to avoid exhausting yourself and having to take time off to recover when you can least afford it. If you pace yourself, you will make good headways with your projects, yet you won’t be exhausted or neglect other aspects of your life.

 

The first thing you need to do is to figure out how much work you can realistically do in a certain time frame (a day, a week, a month). You can’t just focus on your writing (or other creative pursuit), there’s other things in your life, too. You might have a full-time job to juggle and there are also friends and family to spend time with. Sit down and write down what you do every day - create a timetable for every day of the week, if you can. Look at free time you have, once all you need to do in a day is accounted for. Gauge how much of that you would realistically be able to set aside for your project. Then figure out how much of the project you could do in that time.

You won’t be able to use that time for your project every day, of course. Life happens and changes our plans. Yet, you will in general be able to use this time for your project and you can gauge how long the project might take you to finish with that amount of time at your disposal. That is helpful, because you can plan this way, can see when you’ll finally have your first draft, second draft, final draft in your hands. When you can present your book to the world. It’s motivating to know that you’ll be done and, ideally, when you might be done.

 

Next, figure out how long you can work in one go without exhausting yourself. It’s of no use to you to work five hours (in addition to your full-time job) every day for a week, only to be so exhausted that you can hardly drag yourself out of bed afterwards or can hardly look at your project without despising it. Take the time you think you can work without a break and then take five or ten minutes off that - people tend to over-estimate what they can do in one go.

Find a rhythm for your work. Do so many minutes of writing, staying focused, and then take so many minutes off for a break. Set yourself clear goals for a day, write that many words or that many chapters (if your chapters are similar in length). Figure out a rhythm which is comfortable for you. It should be manageable every day, hence I suggested not going with the maximum of time you’re certain you can work for without a break. It should not be too long, either. It’s better to do a few shorter ‘work-break’ cycles than to do a longer one which leaves you more tired in the end.

 

Personally, I do like the pomodoro method for pacing myself. It’s comprised of 25 minutes of focused work, 5 minutes of a short break, and, after four cycles, a 15-minute break instead of the 5-minute one.

25 minutes of focused writing aren’t that hard to do. The 5 minutes give me time to stretch, walk around a bit, make myself a coffee or go to the loo. I usually don’t really take the 15-minute break most days, because I usually need three ‘work-break’ cycles for a chapter and I take time to read it through afterwards, which comes with a longer break. Yet, if the situation is like that, if I reach those four cycles and will continue, I do make use of the longer break to reset myself a little.

Think about this: if you do four of those cycles and the 15-minute break, you will have worked for 100 minutes and have taken 30 minutes of a break (three times 5 and one time 15 minutes). You will not be overly exhausted, taking a break after 25 minutes of work, and will have gotten a lot done. You will probably be able to work for another four cycles afterwards if you have the whole day at your disposal.

 

There will be times in your life when you will have to re-evaluate your time and see what new targets are realistic. You might have more time to work on your projects or less, you might have to change your approach (I started out as a discovery writer and am plotting by now), or you might have to change how much you can do before you become exhausted. Life is change and changes are inevitable. Don’t try to force yourself to stay with your current methods if they’re no longer working - change them instead.

 

It’s less easy for a discovery writer to pace themselves when the inspiration has struck them and they know precisely how the next couple of scenes should work out, but discovery writers have a ‘natural’ pacing built in, because there will always be those times when they can’t write because the rest of the story isn’t ‘ready’ yet. If you’re a discovery writer, try not to overdo it, but if the inspiration comes, ride with it.

 

Pacing yourself helps you to pull through with projects more easily. Knowing how much you can realistically do in a month helps you with estimating how long a project will take you. Having a certain quota to meet in a day or a week keeps you motivated - if it is realistic and can be reached most of the time. Do not exhaust yourself, you’ll get much more done when you’re going at a slower steady pace. That goes for writing as well as for long-distance running. What’s good for a marathon, is also good for a manuscript. Pace yourself and reach your goal!

Maintaining Tension

Tension is what keeps your audience reading, what makes them enjoy their time with your story. Therefore, maintaining the tension in your stories is very important. Tension is created through stakes and conflict, so those, too, are part of this post.

 

First of all, as mentioned, conflict creates tension. What many authors balk at is the expression ‘Conflict,’ but that is not necessary. ‘Conflict’ doesn’t only stand for violence, explosions, and fights. Those can create tension, but they’re not the only way to create it. In general, everything that stands between your main character and their ‘want,’ their goal, is considered conflict. In a comedy, that might be all the shenanigans which happen, in a romance, it could be a second suitor, in a crime story, it is the mystery itself. All of those things are also sources of tension, making the audience wonder whether or not there will be a happy ending - whether the main character will get what they want.

Of course, depending on genre, ‘conflict’ can also stand for bombs, guns, and collateral damage. Yet, if you’re writing in a genre where that is part of the conflict, you shouldn’t complain about it - you chose the genre you work in.

Conflict creates tension by throwing roadblock in the way. Will the main character manage to get through all those shenanigans and be home in time for dinner? Will the main character surpass the suitor in the love interest’s eyes? Will the main character solve the mystery and deliver the culprit to justice? That is where tension comes from, that is what the audience wants to know. By putting something in the main character’s way, by letting them fail here and there, by having them take a detour, you create more tension. You make it less likely that they’ll succeed in the end, and you make the audience wonder how the main character might succeed, since some of the obvious ways are now out.

 

Tension needs to rise throughout the story to keep the audience engaged. You can’t start a story with the highest possible tension - such as the main character on the verge of dying - and then simply let it drop afterwards. A moment of high tension can be used for the hook (see below), but in general you want for the tension to start on a lower level. The full extent of the conflict is usually not obvious at the beginning and the roadblocks are not yet visible. The tasks might seem doable or even easy - after all, your main character just has to get back home from work, how hard can that be?`

Yet, tension also can’t rise constantly. Just as a human can’t tense their muscles the whole time, but needs to relax them every now and then, tension needs to go up in a more jagged, stair-like motion, otherwise the audience will grow tired and stop reading - which is what you want to avoid. The right way to raise the tension, therefore, is by pushing it up with a few scenes throughout which the conflict grows stronger and the main character is under pressure, then release that pressure after the highest point and give both the character and the audience a moment of rest with a low-tension, low-stakes scene. After the detective stalks a suspect and is almost killed by a falling flowerpot, they’re talking to the love interest for a while and they’re not in danger of another flowerpot hitting them.

From that point of recovery, the tension can then rise again. Having those points is especially important in high-tension, high-stakes stories. When everything is a life-and-death decision, there has to be the occasional scene where the main character or characters can take a breather, take care of their injuries, and repair their equipment. That’s what is often called ‘downtime’ and it’s important to have, but not to overuse. Too much downtime might bring the tension back to the baseline and that shouldn’t happen once the story has fully begun. To keep the audience engaged, there must always be some tension and the tension must almost always be on the upward path.

 

Many stories start with a plot hook - an initial conflict or suggestion of a conflict meant to pull the audience in (hence it’s called a ‘hook’).

The plot hook can be a scene from later in the story which is set in the first chapter to tell the audience that something dangerous, something high-stake will be happening. The next scenes then lead up to the plot hook and the story continues after it has been reached. This can work, but it means that tension will fall well below the original hook for a while and that can also turn audiences off.

The plot hook can also be a suggestion of the main conflict in the first scene. Perhaps, the main character is worrying about a decision they have to make (such as a political marriage in an appropriate setting or whether they’ll join the monster hunters or something else that promises tension). In a crime story, the first scene is often the murder or the discovery of the body, which is high in tension by itself and also presents the mystery and thus the main conflict of the story.

Usually, the tension goes down a little after the initial hook - the conflict from the first scene is either postponed or it’s resolved to a degree, even if there’s a suggestion that it’s not over. The body has been found, but nobody else is in danger of dying right now, nobody has been accused yet, and it might not even be certain that it was murder (those pesky suicidal flowerpots…). The marriage might be postponed because something has come up that the future spouse has to deal with first or there might be a shift in power and the marriage might no longer be that pressing. Yet, the threat, the conflict, still hovers on the horizon. That is a good setup for a story: the audience is invested in the original conflict, yet the tension is relatively low and can be raised.

 

Tension is integral to storytelling and necessary for a story to work. It must be raised carefully and maintained while no raise is happening. While it might drop a little after a high-tension scene, giving both the characters and the audience time to rest, it is not allowed to drop to the baseline created in the first chapter again - or even below it. Maintain your tension, keep it rising, and the audience will stay invested.