Here is the complete course.
Welcome to the course on How to write 50k in 30 days. I am pleased to have each of
you here. A little bit about myself. I am Pat Trainum, writing as Patricia Bradley. My
debut novel came out this year—Shadows of the Past and the 2nd book in the series, A
Promise to Protect, releases in October. A general market book from Harlequin
Heartwarming, Matthew's Choice, releases today.
It took me five years to write Shadows, and after I received a 3-book contract in 2012, I
noticed I didn’t have five years to write the next one. I figured out pretty quickly I had to
find a way to write faster, and I’m sharing what I learned with you in this course.
First of all, there are as many ways to write as there are writers out there. No one way is
the only right way. What works for me may not work for you, but I hope you will find a
few nuggets here and there in what I am presenting. The first week, I plan to post
lesson One on Tuesday, after Labor Day. The second and third week I’ll post two
lessons on Monday and Wednesday morning, the fourth week, I’ll post one lesson.
If you do the homework and send it back, I’ll look it over and make comments. I also
hope others will chime in with feedback.
One last thing. I’m attending the Writer’s Police Academy from this Friday through
Sunday so I might not get back to you quickly later in the week. Then, September 23
through the 28th I’ll be at ACFW, but I will post only one lesson that week and will
answer questions as quickly as I can.
Lesson One:
Since there may be levels from beginning writers to pro writers joining this workshop, I’ll
start out with a few basics and work up. There are, for all practical purposes, three basic
styles of writers: (you’ll notice I didn’t state emphatically there are only three) Plotter,
Panster and Tweener. Here’s a brief definition of each.
Plotter: Outlines every scene, labels them action/reaction, has an Excel spreadsheet
listing each scene, has every plot point (turning point) fixed. That’s not to say his
characters can’t suddenly surprise him and take the story in another direction, but when
it does, he goes back and re-outlines. This author’s joy comes in the outlining. This is
where he discovers his story.
Panster: Sits down and starts writing with only a general idea of where she is going and
the story unfolds as she writes. Her joy comes in discovering the story as she goes.
This was me with Shadows of the Past. I started out with 3 characters, a crime, and a
setting. It took me five years to get the story publishable.
Tweener: That’s somewhere between a Plotter and a Panster. This is me right now. I
like to have a general idea of my plot with plot points that I write to, but I don’t know
what in each chapter until I get to it.
Homework for today: Introduce yourselves, tell us what you write, which style
you lean to, and why you prefer that style.
Anytime you have questions, feel free to ask, and I’ll try to answer.
Lesson 2:
Before I begin the actual lessons, I want everyone to know NONE of these tips or
lessons are original with me. These are things I’ve learned from my many mentors,
either in person or in craft books or online. What I’ve done is taken the information that
works for me from each of the teachers I will reference. The last week I will give a list of
books that I’ve used in this course, and I suggest if you do not have them, invest in
copies. If you read them and apply the lessons, it will make a difference in your writing.
Many of the tips I’m passing on to you I learned from Susan May Warren, either at her
Monday Night Chats or at the My Book Therapy Deep Thinkers Retreat.
Before I start writing I have to know six things:






•
•
•
•
•
•
My Story Question
My Characters and their goals
Setting
Moral Premise
Plot—the sequence of events in your story
The last thing I do before I start writing is to tell myself the story in a synopsis
I’ll break these down into smaller lessons.
Let’s start with Story Question first. Your story question is what your story is about. It
drives the story. It’s the map that will keep you on target as you write your story. It is the
what if? It’s often used as an elevator pitch because it should be between 25-50 words.
Shorter is better—I just don’t always get mine really short.
One way to figure out your story question is to determine your protagonist’s goal. Write
a sentence declaring it, and then turn that sentence into a question. Here are a few
Story Questions from famous books or movies:
The Fugitive: Dr. Richard Kimble has been wrongfully accused of murdering his wife.
What is his goal? To prove his innocence and catch the one-armed man who actually
did the crime. So, I might write the Story Question this way: How can an accused
murderer who has escaped from custody prove his innocence and bring to justice those
responsible while being relentlessly pursued by a team of U.S. Marshalls led by a
hardnosed agent interested only in catching his man? That’s forty words. Like I said, it’s
hard for me to condense a story into twenty-five words. 
The Wizard of Oz: Dorothy’s goal? To get home to Kansas—to a place that just earlier
she wanted to escape. So that Story Question might be: What if home is where Dorothy
wants to be and can’t get there?
Return to Me: What is Grace’s goal? To live a normal life and fall in love. That Story
Question might be: What if a woman has a heart transplant and then falls in love with
the husband of the donor? Or this from Susan May Warren’s workbook, From the
Inside Out: Is it possible for a heart to pick it’s recipient and attract the same man twice?
My next book, No Place to Hide: Can an American teacher in Mexico who witnesses a
murder trust her ex-fiancé to rescue her and help her bring the killers to justice? This is
exactly twenty-four words. I’m proud of myself.
Homework: Either improve on one of the Story Questions listed or write the Story
Question for your story.
(Wednesday) Lesson 3: Basic things I need to know about my characters:
You already have your protagonist’s goal from the Story Question. Now it’s time to flesh
out who your character is. I like to know what has happened in the past to make my
character who he or she is when the story opens. I want to know what lie my characters
believe about themselves, what they want more than anything, what they fear, what
their happiest moment from the past is as well as their worst moment. I want to know
what they value, and I give them at least two values that can come into conflict.
Character: Name and role
Worst moment from the past
What do you fear
Happiest moment from the past
Goal
Motivation for the goal
Values (at least 2
I create a chart with that information, and then I write a one-sentence summary about
each character, and then I tell myself their story. Here is my chart and one-sentence
summary for my antagonist:
Character: Name and role
Worst moment from the past
What do you fear
Happiest moment from the past
Goal
Romantic goal
Ambition
Motivation for the goal
Values (at least two)
Victor Montoya, antagonist,
When his parents are murdered by his
uncle and he’s put out on the streets, he
goes from being rich to homeless, and
vows never to be poor again
Being poor and or homeless again
When Kiley said she loved him
To take over his uncle’s cartel and to get
back his daughter, Maria
None
To get what rightfully belongs to him
Revenge
Money, his daughter, revenge
Victor wants what’s rightfully his—justice for his parents’ murders and his daughter and
he’s willing to kill to get both. But what if his revenge costs him his daughter? And what
if he has to choose between his money and his daughter?
Homework: Create a chart for your POV characters and a one-sentence summary
that includes the goal for each, and then tell yourself their back story in one to
three paragraphs. Also give your characters at least two values that can be in
conflict.
I would love to see some of your characters one-sentence summaries and their stories
as well as what your character values.
Lesson 4: As I started the fourth book of my Logan Point series, I had an idea, a really
good one, but I couldn't get past the idea. I was stuck. I looked hither, thither and yon for
something...anything to go with it. I read Randy Ingermanson's Snowflake, a steal at
$2.99, and James Scott Bell's Writing your novel from the Middle, and finally Stanley
Williams' The Moral Premise. All three referred to the same thing...a point in the middle
of the book where your POV characters have a defining moment and change the way
they do things. Before I could start the book I needed to have that turning point. Then I
could write the first half of my book with the characters, including the villain, making
wrong choices, and the last half with the protagonists turning to the right choices and
the villain continuing to make even worse choices.
But how did I get there?
I wracked my brain for a day trying to figure out what the moral premise could be, then I
realized it revolved around my heroine's greatest fear...and that was it--because of
something that had happened in her past, she was afraid to trust anyone. I now knew
what my turning point in the middle of the book had to be. She had to be faced with a
choice of trusting the hero or continuing the path she'd been on most of her life.
I wracked my brain for a day trying to figure out what the moral premise could be, then I
realized it revolved around my heroine's greatest fear...and that was it--because of
something that had happened in her past, she was afraid to trust anyone. I now knew
what my turning point in the middle of the book had to be. She had to be faced with a
choice of trusting the hero or continuing the path she'd been on most of her life. For the
hero, he had to learn to trust God, and for the antagonist...well he didn't trust anyone-he's the only one that doesn't change. Another way of looking at it is to ask what can
your leads(s) do at the end of the book that he or she can't do at the beginning?
Braveheart: Compromise of liberty leads to tyranny; but dying for liberty leads to
freedom.
Liar! Liar! Lying leads to distrust and rejection; but telling the truth leads to
trustworthiness and admiration.
An Officer and a Gentleman: Giving ourselves to others leads to a better life. Or put
another way: Deceiving ourselves and others leads to despair and death; but
truthfulness to ourselves and others leads to hope and life.
The Terminator: Sacrificial love leads to life; but hatred leads to death.
Homework: What is the moral premise for your story? Or name a movie and
identify the moral premise.
More in the next lesson on the turning point.
(Wednesday) Lesson 5: The turning point in the middle of the book.
I watched the movie Thelma and Louise the other day—my first time ever. And since
I’ve been using the Mirror Moment or Moment of Grace in my last two books, I was
curious as to whether the movie contained a moment like that. I fast-forwarded the
movie to the exact middle and began watching. It amazed me when I saw each main
character in their Moment of Grace or Mirror Moment. Both were given an opportunity to
take a different path, one that would have led to a different resolution, and both turned it
down. Thelma was given the opportunity to remain faithful to her husband and Louise
was given the opportunity to marry the man she was in love with. This was after the
shooting but before they started their rampage of robberies, etc. At that point there was
still a chance they could go back to their old lives and make them better, but after they
rejected the Moment of Grace, their lives took a continuing downward spiral,
ending…well, you know how it ended.
That is my next step. Identify what that scene will look like. It won’t be momentous, and
is usually only a sentence or two, but it will shift the way your lead characters view
everything. For the first half of the book, they are living under a vice…in my heroine’s
case, fear and self-protection. At the mid-way point, my heroine will be given the choice
to trust the hero and open herself up to love—or not. The end of the book will depend
on how she chooses.
Some mirror moments/and or moments of grace:
Gone with the Wind: Scarlett vows to rebuild Tara.
Casablanca: Humphrey Bogart realizes he’s a drunk who helps no one…after that, he
helps the Resistance.
To figure out that point, I make a chart (adapted from the Moral Premise) for my POV
characters with their behavior before the event that changes them, the event, and the
outcome.
Character name:
Story goal
Here you can add
other story goals.
Behavior before:
what is the vice
practiced that leads to
defeat?
Change event where
the character is
offered a choice to
between the vice and
the virtue and
embraces virtue
Behavior after where
the character
practices the virtue
and experiences
victory
For your antagonist: [vice] leads to defeat; and [greater vice] leads to [greater defeat]
Character name:
Behavior before:
what is the vice
practiced that leads to
defeat?
Change event where
the character is
offered a choice to
between the vice and
the virtue and
embraces virtue
Behavior after where
the character
practices the greater
vice and experiences
greater defeat
Story goal
Other story goals like
personal or career
goals can be added
Homework: Using the chart, plot out your characters’ story arcs. Or use a movie
you like and put each character’s story arc in the table.
Monday Lesson 6. Creating a one paragraph summary. Once I know my Story
Question, who my characters are, which includes their values and their goals—both
personal and physical, I create a five-sentence summary of the book using that
information. The first sentence introduces the set-up, (characters, setting, problem). The
second sentence tells what happens up to the inciting incident—disaster that leads the
hero/heroine commit to the goal that thrusts them out of Act 1 and into Act 2. The third
sentence explains what happens up until the Moment of Change (middle of the book).
The fourth sentence tells what happens up to the Black Moment or Biggest disaster and
the end of Act 2. The fifth sentence takes us to the final battle where the lead character
either wins or loses. Here is the one-paragraph summary of a book I wrote a while back.
If you’ll notice, I’ve color-coded it so I can ‘see’ it better.
Matt has left his old hometown of Cedar Grove behind and is on the threshold of having
it all—about to propose to his boss’s daughter, has a cushy job and drives a BMW
convertible. Then his old flame, Allie Carson arrives at his apartment with the news that his
sister is in the hospital from a drug overdose and her 9-year-old son that Matt’s never met is
going into foster care if he doesn’t do something. Matt is forced to return to Cedar Grove to
get the boy, and is told he can’t take his nephew back to Memphis and must stay long
enough to get the boy settled or get the problem of taking him to Memphis resolved.
More complications arise—the dysfunctional nephew doesn’t like Matt, and then Matt is
drawn to Allie and the calmness of Cedar Grove he’d never appreciated, even as he
fights to keep from losing a big account back in Memphis because he isn’t at work.
When Allie helps him connect to the boy and his and Allie’s spark ignites into a flame,
Matt comes to the realization that success isn’t defined by money and things, but by
peace and contentment, and he asks her to marry him and stay in Cedar Grove.
I will then take this paragraph and use it to tell myself the story. I know pansters don't want to do
this step, but I've found if I don't tell myself the story, I get lost in the middle of the book. And like
I said, these are just suggestions and ways that I write. You will create your own pattern of
writing.
Homework: Write a five-sentence summary of your story.
Lesson 7: This is the last lesson! Yay! You’ve made it through. You are now ready to
begin writing! 
Truly, after I have done all the homework, I am then ready to write and this is how I
decide how much to write each day if I’m only writing 50K in a month:
Divide 50,000 by 30 = 1666.6666
Write 1,666 words a day for 29 days.
On the last day, I write 1,686 words
Actually…
When I start writing, I write 15,000 words a week until I have 80,000 words for my first
draft—this takes about 6 weeks. Then I go back and flesh it out, adding another 15,000
words for a total of 95,000 words. After I probably polish a couple more times before I
send it to my editor. I make sure every scene has a goal and obstacles, that I have used
the right words to set the tone of the scene, and then I run a check for weasel words
and for passive words.
I want to thank everyone for taking the workshop, and I hope you find it helpful. It may
not work for everyone, but I hope there is something here that will help you and open up
new writing possibilities.
Here are the craft books I use and have mentioned in the course lessons:
Susan May Warren’s Workbooks: Writing from the Inside Out, Kiss and Tell; and the
Book Buddy can be found at her website: urlm.in/tadp
Randy Ingermanson’s How to Write a Novel Using the Snowflake Method can be found
on Amazon at urlm.in/tado and B&N http://ow.ly/C4gbf —this is an e-book and is very
easy to understand.
James Scott Bell’s Write your Novel from the Middle can be found on Amazon
at urlm.in/tadq B&N - http://ow.ly/C4gLx It too is an e-book.
And Stanley Williams’ book The Moral Premise can be found on Amazon at
urlm.in/tadr and at B&N- http://ow.ly/C4hmn
I’ve also found Chris Volger’s book, The Hero’s Journey very helpful. It’s at Amazonurlm.in/tads ; B&N http://ow.ly/C4kB9 - It’s a Paperback.
I wish you the best in your writing!
Patricia
Pat Trainum writing as Patricia Bradley
www.patriciabradleyauthor.com
http://mbtponderers.blogspot.com/
Follow me on Twitter: @PTBradley1
Follow me on FaceBook: www.facebook.com/patriciabradleyauthor
Shadows of the Past - Revell February 2014
A Promise To Protect - Revell October 2014
Matthew's Choice - Heartwarming September 2014
Shop Amazon for my books under Patricia Bradley
I asked God to teach me patience and He gave me a book to write