That is what I define as a novel: something that has a beginning, a middle and an end, with characters and a plot that sustain interest from the first sentence to the last. But that is not what I do at all.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
A story should have a beginning, a middle and an end, but not necessarily in that order.
And I don't want to begin something, I don't want to write that first sentence until all the important connections in the novel are known to me. As if the story has already taken place, and it's my responsibility to put it in the right order to tell it to you.
Although when I start a novel I know how it will begin and end, I like to let the people within the story take me on a journey between those points without having a fixed plan.
The point about a great story is that it's got a beginning, a middle and end.
I'm one of those people who think that stories should have a beginning, a middle and an end, and then they're over, and then you tell the next story.
When I'm putting a story together, I generally know the ending and a couple of the points halfway through, and I've got sort of an idea about the beginning, and although I do write the story one sentence at a time, when I'm thinking it up, I'm thinking it up all at once.
It's nice to know when you're a part of a story, it's nice to know at least something about the beginning, middle, and end.
The book doesn't end when you finish writing it.
I don't necessarily start with the beginning of the book. I just start with the part of the story that's most vivid in my imagination and work forward and backward from there.
There is no other way of writing a novel than to begin at the beginning at to continue to the end.