You have out grown the proza and short story era and are now ready to move on to the next level. Off you go with the idea and perhaps the whole plot in your head. Or maybe you just start with a short tale you’ve written earlier and hope you can extend this into a novel length story. Enthusiastically spending every free moment behind your desk you create page after page, until you run out of steam. Soon the excuses follow one after the other. I can’t write today because I have other things to do. Or you get stuck in what will happen next. You might have the plot lined out but this doesn’t mean you know what your characters are up to all the time. You do know who is going to be killed and who done it, but what about the other events they are involved in and the sub characters?

For a story to work you need;

• a protagonist which plays the main character/hero.
• his or her antagonist who creates problems and obstacles. There can be more than one antagonist.
• a central character. The central character may be the protagonist or the antagonist or it could be another character.

A false protagonist can be used to fool the reader’s preconceptions regarding who the story is really about. It involves presenting a character at the beginning of the book as one of the main characters, but then generally disposing of this character, often by killing the person. Sometimes they change their role and leave the story by going on a holiday or something similar. They could also be revealed as being the actual antagonist.

A story that has multiple equal protagonists that then sees one of them disappear or die (especially late in the work) is not a use of the false protagonist technique. The method refers only to those works where the reader is fooled into thinking that one character is the primary focus of the work, only to have them replaced completely by another (usually previously unseen) character.

This might sound complicated and therefore it is advised for the beginner novelist to make profiles of all the main characters in the story. What role are the playing, their name, age , colour of hair, size, sex etc as much information as possible. This is to help you to avoid silly mistakes. Had your main character grey hair in chapter one and his name was Peter, he can’t all of a sudden show up in chapter 20 as a blond man by the name of Paul. Yes those mistakes happen. Your story has to be consistent

Writing a book is a lengthy process and can be off putting if you run out off steam after having penned 10 chapters. You have managed to write 40.000 words and the story is almost finished. The hero is bound to catch the thief/killer soon and all be will be quiet in the village again. This means that with 40.000 to 50.000 words you have by far not written a novel. Should you be alarmed? Of course not. If your story is well plotted and written you have nothing to worry about. Good writing is not about the quantity but about the quality.

If you story is between 17.000 and 40.000 words you have written a novella

Is your story between 40.000 and 80.000 words you have written a novelette

Here are some examples of novellas;

• George Orwell – The animal farm
• Andrey Kurkov – The death and the penguin
• Ernest Hemingway – The old nan and the sea
• Franz Kafta – The metamorphosis
• Leo Tolstoy – The death of Ivan ILyich
• Konsalik – Appointment in the mist

The general rule is that a novel has more complex plot than a novella but I think rules are there to be broken. However the novel offers more room for extensive character building. Nevertheless a novella or novelette can be as good as a novel and sometimes even better. Leaving out an extensive description of characters gives the reader the opportunity to create their own handsome hero.