Search results for goal

CMwww.chaptermuse.com › Guide › Plan a scene

How to write a scene that turns

Every craft book will now say the same three words at you. Goal, conflict, disaster.

• A scene turns when something stops being possible
• Austen turns a proposal on eight words
• Agreement is what's killing your kitchen scene
• If the beats can be shuffled, they were never causal

CMwww.chaptermuse.com › Guide › Novel november

NaNoWriMo 2026 & Novel November Guide

If you join an organised challenge, check that organiser’s time zone, counting rules and closing time. What happened to NaNoWriMo?

CMwww.chaptermuse.com › Guide › Create a story bible

The story bible you'll actually use

The same thing happened at the far end of the scale: the continuity apparatus behind The Wheel of Time (eventually four million words of notes and a published companion volume)

CMwww.chaptermuse.com › Guide › Dialogue and subtext

How to fix on-the-nose dialogue

The problem is not accuracy: it is that a line whose meaning is fully contained in its words leaves the reader with nothing to work out, and working things out is most of what reading fiction consists of.

CMwww.chaptermuse.com › Guide › Revise a novel

How to revise a novel so the revision ends

But five passes that were all the same pass count as one, which is why writers who have "done nine drafts" are often still on their first.

CMwww.chaptermuse.com › Daily › Tasks › Beginnings 15

An opening with a deadline: Story openings…

10-minute story openings and endings exercise. Start a story with someone trying to complete a small job before a visitor arrives.

CMwww.chaptermuse.com › Guide › Format a book

Format a novel for submission, print and EPUB

Contents 01Each file has a different reader, and the reader decides the rules 02Manuscript format is a working surface, not a design 03The word count you report is real; the one they used to use wasn't 04Front and back matter…

CMwww.chaptermuse.com › Guide › Scrivener migration

Moving a novel out of Scrivener, safely

Open the unzipped copy in Scrivener and confirm it is your book: the right chapters, the right word count, your most recent day's writing present at the end of it.

CMwww.chaptermuse.com › Guide › How to write a novel

How to Write a Novel: The Whole Job, in Order

One vivid scene teaches you the voice, the person and the turn, and momentum survives on visible progress. Do I need special software to write a novel?

CMwww.chaptermuse.com › Guide › Sagging middle

How to diagnose a sagging middle

By any honest count you are past halfway, the sentences still come out, and none of the chapters you wrote this month are bad.