I will need not re-emphasize that this series is specifically for those that just want to learn how to write fiction. And should not be seen a drawback to those of you that that have a knowledge of literature. Also if you follow it thoroughly, you’ll be writing fiction like a pro. Thanks.



We will be dropping it regularly

Genres of Fiction


Genre: This also means category. It is from each category than some subgenres stem from. The industry divides types of novels into two major categories.
The first, known as literary, is a character-driven story that may or may not fit into a specific genre. For simplicity, literary novels will not be broken down any further than to say that many are mainstream and have broad appeal — and, although some fit neatly into plot-driven categories and are called crossover novels, many do not.
The second major category encompasses genre or escapist fiction and generally emphasizes a plot-driven situation as well as characters.
However, the most popular among them are
Thriller- Medical, military, Techno, Sci-fi, Technical
Suspense- Same subgenre as Thriller
Horror- Vampire, Werewolfs, Monster,Gothic
Mystery/Detective- Amateur detective, Cozy, The police Pandora, Private detective, Puzzle
Romance- Suspense, Time travel, Historical, Contemporary, gothic, Regency.
Science Fiction- Apocalyptic,Cyberpunk, First contact, Hard, Military, Soft/sociological, Space opening e.t.c
Spy/Espionage
Children
New age/ Inspirational
Western
Religious
Gay/lesbian
Adventure
Action
Erotica

You’ll find the most popular novel-length fiction will be in the range of 45,000 to 125,000 words. This doesn’t mean you’ll be right to sell a thriller novel of 45,000 words or a cozy mystery of 125,000 words. The accepted lengths of particular novels are mostly genre related and may vary between publishing houses. An easy way to determine what seems to be an acceptable length for the novel you’re writing is for you to refer to the bookstore shelves. The surest way, of course, is by researching the publisher’s website or through reference manuals that list publishers. That said, a 75,000 to 90,000-word manuscript is generally considered respectable.
Three Genres to Notice
Oddities. Numerous oddities have been published over recent years that might not fit neatly into a genre or are unusual due to size. The Christmas Box, The Bridges of Madison County and The Celestine Prophecy were all small by the way of word count, but each of these books ended up as bestsellers. To use them as guides might be a mistake for the beginning novelist, as they are considered experimental and thus can be hard to sell. I might note that all three of these books were originally self-published and received critical notice due to the authors’ own hard work and tenacity at self-marketing.
Serial and Sequel are types of novels that often find great success. They feature reappearing characters and / or recurring themes. You’ll find these novels popular in most current genres. What makes them successful, of course, are convincingly real, yet original characters and situations.
Sex, Foul Language, Violence, Death and Aberrant Behavior. The amount and depth of risqué scenes, controversial themes and offensive language you include in your novel is not only story and genre dependent but also depends on the tastes and policies of your publisher. It can limit not only your audience but whether your novel will get published all together. Candid, uncensored scenes depicting real-life scenarios are important to the integrity of writer and story, but understanding the audience and dealing with those matters tastefully and appropriately are just as important.
Sex and sexual tension as well as violence are key factors in most aspects of human life and can be interesting and important dimensions of many stories. However, the amounts of these elements and the approach taken by the writer should be considered carefully. How these important and controversial aspects of human life are portrayed in adult novels will be very different than in young-adult mysteries.
Again, the best advice I can offer is to look at novels already published and currently on bookstore shelves to see what is appropriate. Even then, a good rule of thumb is that a story should never include gratuitous sex or violence. However, these issues should be dealt with if they are important aspects of the story itself. Perhaps you feel explicit depiction of a violent rape / murder scene provides important character motivation, characterization or plot information in a novel about Miami drug gangs. If so, fine. But in typical suspense or mystery novels, giving details about body fluids and death throes probably won’t be appropriate.
In his book Novel Writing Made Easy, Kindle Publishers, Gordon Kessler had this to say.
Be honest with yourself and with your writing. Don’t pull punches because your mother or your pastor might read your story. Make your scenes live, give them verisimilitude by realistic depiction, but do so with consideration of what is acceptable to your target audience.
For an example of a story written in a genre that is generally full of violence and four letter words but was very well done without either, read Ted Dekker’s thriller Three. It’s an incredible novel that I read without realizing its publisher, Westbow, is a religious publishing house. Discovering this after I finished the novel, I tried to recall if at any point Dekker crossed the line by using crude language or gratuitous sex or violence, and I realized he hadn’t. Still, he told a fantastic story, and I hadn’t noticed the lack of swearing or graphic violence. What an excellent job of storytelling!
- NovelWriting Made Easy, Gordon Kessler. www.Gordonkessler.com

Exercise 1
Write Five short story of not more than 500 hundred words. The Five stories must be from different Genres.

Theme

This is the central idea in a piece of work. Although there are other ideas that may be birth in your story, the concept which you decided to write about is the main idea in your story.
Merriam Webster defines it as the ‘The main subject that is being discussed often or repeatedly’.
Few stories are written simply to entertain - some young children’s stories might be, but most stories are, in reality, an entertaining ‘vehicle’ or means for their author to present a series of persuasive ideas to the reader. These ideas are called the themes of the story; they are the author’s views concerning some important aspect - one if the ‘big issues’ - of life. Many authors choose themes that relate to aspects of their society’s prevailing or dominant ideologies.
As I said earlier, you can’t entertain without Educate. But it’s mundane to keep Educating without entertaining. Who wants to read your rant about life issues. They need to realise this truth themselves. Your story has to show them what they need to see.
Writers are peculiarly creative and sensitive individuals; they can be deeply aware of the frictions within society. They use their imaginative genius to weave compelling stories around interesting characters to highlight and help you sympathise with certain ideas and points of view. And this is what you should always aim to do.
If you have read ‘ Purple Hibiscus’ by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, however much you enjoyed the story, after you finish the last page and close the cover, many of its ideas will stay with you for a long time, if not for the remainder of your life. These ideas or themes will have been revealed and explored in the story through the actions of its characters. You will have been brought to empathise with and often feel sympathy for the plight of certain characters in a story, and to dislike others. Those with which you sympathise, you will tend to feel strongly about, even identify with. What happens to them will interest you - and it is in this way that many ideas about society can be highlighted and brought to your attention.
J.K Rowling’s Novel, HarryPorter1-7’ centred on the way people saw death. Although many other theme were birth from the original theme like the issue of bad parenting/Guiding( from Guidants). We were open to series of ways Voldemort tried to escape death.
To develop a theme, these questions should ring in your mind.
1.Why am I writing?
What lesson do I want to teach in this story?
In the movie Afterlife written by Will Smith, the concept of Fear was discussed through a child point of view(POV).
What misconception do I want to correct? Many horror movies we see and horror novels that are out there are out to prove a religious truth or a psychological fact. A good film that portrayed that is the Exorcism of Emily. The film was trying to bring to the notice of readers that there are spiritual occurrences.

How do you get Theme?
The following ways are the best way to get a theme.
Love: What do you like? What is that thing you love others to know how to do? What is that message you wish others should learn of? What do you want to people improve themselves on.
Hatred: What do you hate most? What problems are you seeing in Nigeria? The best novels and plays in Nigeria are noticed because they portrayed a hatred for certain event or culture.
Things fall apart by Chinua Achebe was known because it was trying to show the world the way European maltreated Eastern Nigerians. And that Igbo community had a system that governs them at the advent of the whites.


Exercise 2
Now, look at any of the story you wrote above and give it a theme. It is also good you put some enduring themes.
These may be such theme as
care of environment brings rewards.
You have to take the rough with the smooth’
‘crime never pays’
‘love conquers all’ or whatever takes your heart’s desire.
Again look at your story and look for opportunities to add symbols (these could even be scene changes or character additions or alterations) that assist you to convey this message in subtle ways throughout the story, or at least by its completion.
This sort of symbol is again open to a great variety of possibilities but get the PDF to see. ideas

Plot
This is the line with which event in a story happens. It refers to the way the author makes event happen in his story. The action element in fiction is the arrangement of events that make up a story.
In present time, the best sellers are divided into two broad format.
Timely stories: These are plots taken from tomorrow’s headline. They include events that concern modern happenings. This events might include near-future problems. They are written with a view of providing alternative solutions to this problems or an alternative which, though, might not be satisfactory but is popularly accepted. They use things that are recent, thereby causing realism to be felt in their story.
Universal stories: These deal with Universal theme of human heart and mind that are always and will be of interest. They are concerned with romance and of survival. Some go as far as changing belief systems and making us have a rethink about life. An example of such is The Celestine Prophecy by James Redfield.

Plot can be structured in the following ways.
Internal plot: This is the thought plot. It is seen through the Point of view from which the story is being told. This deals the POV’s emotion. How it changes. The internal plot is essential in making a believable Character. You can’t present a character who cannot think, who is seen only performing but does not detest things, does not like things, does not have quirks etc.
Emotional plot: This refers to the tie between few people in the story. It deals with conflict of desire between two characters. It also deal with their ability to agree on something or the rate at which they agree. And if they disagree always, there must be a place the disagreement either help them or mar them. Also, if they always agree on issues/things, then their agreement must cause trouble for them or help them out of dire situation.
Thematic plot: This is when the story revolves around the theme that is to be taught.
Here you change events to suite what you are teaching. You have to make sure the
events of your plots are acceptable by your readers. As that might cause your novel to be thrown aside for no reason.
External plot: This revolves around the storyline itself. It gives you ample opportunities to show events without just telling us what happened in the story. It is typically based on visuals, physical actions or what happens.
Exercise 3
Infuse the four plots structure into your story. Preferably, write it out on a note.


BASIC PLOTS
There are 6 basic plots for most of all fiction that have been used by all writers and may be used by beginning writers without fear of plagiarism. These may be used alone or in combination and form the basis of nearly all story conflicts, for books, plays, movies, television programs, etc.
Lost and Found - Person or object is lost and recovered Ex.: Lost or Home Alone
Character vs. Nature - Character survives a natural calamity Ex.: Jaws or Volcano
Character with a personal problem or goal - character solves it. reaches goal or changes attitude or feelings.
Good Guys vs. Bad Guys - good guys usually win Ex.: The Three Little Pigs or most westerns
Crime and Punishment or Mystery and Solution - Character solves a mystery or crime and the culprit is caught or punished Ex.: Matlock or Murder She Wrote
Boy meets Girl - Problems or misunderstandings arise;
Characters resolve differences or clear up misunderstandings Ex.: Romeo and Juliet or Snow White or Cinderella

Exercise 4
Plot 6 stories. One story from each of the six basic rule.



Plotting Continues

We must also consider not just creating any plot but a plot that portrays our theme and is also entertaining. Meanwhile, you don’t have to keep repeating the theme in the story. The readers don’t need to choked. You can’t allow a character to teach about that theme. Neither do you have the right to talk a whole length about it. And to prevent that you need to know the basic elements.
Here are some basic elements of a plot. They must happen in your story if you really want to give a good story to the world.
a. Conflict is the driving force of your story — what makes the static photo inside readers’ minds into a dynamic moving picture. For your story to be successful, your protagonist must battle both external and internal conflict.
The external conflict, the physical action, is the easy one. It is the race the heroine must win, the mountain climb the hero must make, the battle against terrorists your Delta Force must wage. It is the ticking clock — the navigating around and through all things physical that stand in the way of your protagonist reaching the desired goal. This type of conflict is best conveyed in real-time, dynamic exposition.
The internal conflict is more difficult, the challenge many beginning novelists forget. Unfortunately so, as the internal conflict is the unseen force that solidly sets your characters and your story into a realistic world. It is the fear of heights, the suppressed memories, the regrets and emotional losses of your protagonist. It is what makes the protagonist what she is today, causes her to think the way she does and do the things she does. Where action is the best way to show your story’s external conflicts, dialogue and internalization are the best ways to present the internal ones.
For a more in depth look at conflict, check out Writers Digest Books’ Conflict, Action & Suspense by William Noble.
Exercise 5
Now write out internal and external plots for your story

Plot Fuels
Notice: Plot evolves through conflict to exposition, that provides background information needed to make sense of the action, describes the setting, and introduces the major characters; these plots develop a series of complications or intensifications of the conflict that lead to a crisis or moment of great tension. The conflict may reach a climax or turning point, a moment of greatest tension that fixes the outcome; then, the action falls off as the plot’s complications are sorted out and resolved (the resolution or dénouement).
Be aware, however, that much of twentieth-century fiction does not exhibit such strict formality of design.
The conflict, goal, problem, or what the main character wants should be set up in the first sentence, paragraph, page, or chapter, depending upon a story’s length, If not stated outright, it should at least be hinted at very strongly.
So, you need to create tension in order to keep your readers interested. Make your readers wonder, "What happens next?"
And to get that effect, you can use these plot fuels:
Time pressure - The character has a limited amount of time in which to accomplish a goal or solve a problem.
Ex.: Rumpelstiltskin, Hansel and Gretel Other time pressures include:
Forces of nature - Rain coming in. impending storm, etc.
Deadline dates - preparations, contest entry deadlines, athletic training for a specific contest, mortgage payment, bomb set to go off, harvest before the rain frost, onset of winter, etc. Arrival of holiday - birthday of Christmas gifts to make, etc.
Setbacks - The most important part of the plot is the series of setbacks the main character faces in trying to resolve the conflict or attain the goal. In well-developed fiction, there are often 3 or more of them. The series of setbacks make up the middle of the story. The main character overcomes each successively more difficult setback - the last one in a grand way to a satisfactory close.
Events or setbacks that might temporarily prevent the characters from solving their problems are:
injuries
weather
losses
mistakes
misunderstandings
mishaps or accidents
Reader Is In On a Secret the Character Doesn't Know - Tension rises when the reader learns something through the narration that the character doesn't know. The reader becomes anxious for the character.
Ex. The bed is frayed and about to break.
A villain is hiding in the house. A trap has been laid.
Anticipation of a Major Scene - Characters set up the tension through their dialogue about the Big Event or their warnings. They anticipate another character’s arrival or action(s).