Before we start: Please forgive me for putting myself into the story. I'm a newspaper reporter, not a professor of the novel, so I don't have any frame of reference for this except my own experience. I've been writing fic in various fandoms since the 1960s (ST:TOS), although very few people ever saw any of it until I posted "And Death Shall Have No Dominion" last year.

Writing a Novel
by Jean Helms

Sometimes, a novel is an accident: A writer starts out with an idea, begins writing and doesn't reach a good stopping place until hundreds of kilobytes have been slain for the cause.

That can make for a good story, and some really good fanfics have happened in just that way.

More often, I suspect, it's the plot that dictates the length. A short story can get along just fine with a simple plot (or lots of schmoop and sex with no plot at all) but if you want to write an X-File, if your plot is at all complex, you'll be writing a novel-length fic of 200k or larger before you know it.

A novel is much more than just a longer version of a short story. Sure, any fic, to be successful, needs good characterization, a working knowledge of canon, good grammar and spelling and a theme, but a novel needs much more. A novel, to sustain a reader's interest from start to finish, needs a major plot and at least one subplot.

(X-Files writers have it easy in that respect: Take a case file as your major plot and some MSR as your subplot, and you're on your way.)

The short version of what I learned by writing a novel is this:

1. Have a plot in mind.
2. Write an outline.
3. Fill in the details.
4. Motivate the characters.
5. Beta, beta, beta.

Now here's the longer version:

I learned years ago from a friend in the advertising business that when you're planning an ad campaign, you begin with the last day of the campaign and work backward until you get to the beginning. That applies equally well to writing a novel.

When I started writing "And Death Shall Have No Dominion," all I knew was where I wanted to end up: in Maggie Scully's house, with Bill there, and Mulder having to shoot someone to save Tara. It was a simple enough idea; too simple, really, because there was nothing behind it but a kind of "nyah, nyah, what do you think of Mulder now, you nasty old thing?"

The plot, then, was whatever had to happen to get our heroes to that point.

I decided to make the "somebody who got shot" a serial killer, because I just love Profiler!Mulder and I thought it would be cool to have him track the killer to the Scully residence. I also love separation/reunion MSR, so I decided that would be part of the plot, too.

That was it for major plots; I also had two major subplots, but those came later as I sought to explain why things were happening as they did. There's more about that under "Details."

To write a long fic without losing your way, you need an outline.

An outline can function as a map, directing you from point A -- your opening paragraph -- to point Z, the last line of the novel. It can also function as a framework, letting you write scenes as they come to mind and insert them into the outline where they belong. I find that works better for me than trying to write straight through from beginning to end.

A fic outline, of course, does not have to be anything like the outlines you had to write and turn in to your English teacher. It can be as simple as a list of short sentences, although if the tried-and-true method of numbering and lettering works for you, go for it.

My original outline was short -- very short -- but it had the basic elements of what would later become "ADSHND," sketched out in single sentences.

I added subplots -- the threat of anthrax, the crippling effects of post- traumatic stress -- and the outline got longer and longer. As I went on, I took out some parts that no longer seemed to fit. All along, I made as sure as I could that the outline kept up with the story.

Details can make anything you write more interesting, as long as they don't get in the way. Writing, for instance, that Scully's cross began to feel hot against her skin as she stood alone in the desert sun might help the readers feel the scene more vividly.

You'll just make your readers laugh, however, if you tell them the cross was especially shiny today because Scully had cleaned it with "Shine! Jewelry Shine!" before she left for work. There's little that's more deadly to a drama than being unintentionally hilarious, and unnecessary details are often laughable because they just don't belong in the story.

Filling in the details that will improve your story takes imagination, research and a good memory.

Imagine your characters as they do the things you've made them do. Is Mulder nervous? Are his lips pressed together, his hands clenched tightly, the skin over the knuckles turning pale? Does he sit up especially straight?

Imagine what Scully looks like when she's trying not to laugh: Is her hand over her mouth? Does her face turn red? Does she turn her head away, knowing that Mulder's equally desperate attempts not to laugh are going to do her in if he catches her eye?

See it in your mind, and then write it.

Anytime you have to step outside your own field of expertise, you need to do some research.

I, for one, know a lot about newspapering and a fair amount about nursing --my former profession -- but not much about profiling, so I popped for a couple of books by John Douglas to help me out. Ditto with post-traumatic stress disorder, only I borrowed a copy of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, also known as DSM-IV, which spells out the diagnostic criteria for hundreds of mental and emotional disorders.

Books aside, the 'net offers hundreds of sites where you can find information on how a SIG Sauer looks, how far it is from Scully's apartment to Mulder's, what's the difference between liberty and leave for Navy personnel, and a whole heck of a lot more. Sites devoted to slang can help you give your story some flavor, but don't get carried away. Most of us know what an UNSUB is (although not everyone does, especially those new to fic), but if you refer to HCPU, you'd better explain that it's the FBI's Health Care Programs Unit.

I highly recommend visiting the FBI's website, www.fbi.gov, which has details not only on the FBI as a whole, but offers links to the field offices as well. Even a tiny detail such as whether a field office is on the north or south side of town can enrich your novel.

Memory is just another way of saying "write what you know." Again, XF writers are at a distinct advantage, because Moose and Squirrel can find themselves working anywhere the American flag flies. That means you can set the action in almost any place you know well.

I set my novel in Mobile, Ala., not because -- as I had Mulder say -- it's the perfect place for bioweapons manufacture, but because it's where I've lived almost all my life and I know this area inside and out. I know how the people here talk, where they go to eat, what they take for a headache and what the weather is like at any given time of year.

Oh, yeah -- I also slipped in a couple of smart-alecky remarks about my own newspaper, but if I can't abuse the Mobile Register, who can?

You can, to some extent, fill in those things by doing research, but to give your story (and especially your dialog) a sense of realism, there's no substitute for first-hand knowledge. I wouldn't attempt to recreate a New Englander's speech because I'd get it wrong; if you're not a Southerner, you'd probably get our dialects wrong, too.

Bottom line: If you don't speak a dialect, don't try to write it. If you do speak it, or know it well, use it sparingly to provide color and a sense of place for your story.

Good characterization does not necessarily mean adhering to the characters as portrayed in the series and the movie. It does mean that, if you're going to depart from the canon, you have to give the readers a reason to find the change believable.

Do you want Mulder to sit on Scully's couch and analyze his feelings for her out loud? Better have a real good reason, because Mulder seldom behaves that way -- think "Tunguska," when Scully says, "What I'm worried about is you, Mulder and how far you'll go. And how far I can follow you."

Some people would respond to that by trying to reassure Scully, or explaining their reasons. Not Mulder: He doesn't say a word. He just picks up his coat and walks out.

Two more examples: In the movie, during the hallway scene, Mulder unburdens himself only briefly before he stops talking and starts moving in for a kiss (sigh). Even in "Requiem," Mulder doesn't say much about how he's feeling while he's snuggling with Scully; he just says he's been thinking about it and he thinks the costs are too high.

Ergo, if Mulder needs to talk to Scully about his feelings for hours because it's important to the plot, there has to be a believable reason: He's exhausted from three days without sleep, or he's had a few too many drinks, or he's just discovered the body of a mangled, mutilated child and he's in deep emotional shock.

The great thing about a novel-length fic is that you have time and space in which to set up a more complicated reason for the characters to behave as they do. You don't have to limit yourself to quick, simple motivations; you can create an entire subplot that explains their behavior in much more depth than you could in a short story.

There is no substitute for a beta reader in a long fic, because a long fic offers so many opportunities to omit important details, leave plotlines unresolved or -- naturally -- misspell words or employ bad grammar.

My beta reader, Lee McBride, began reading "ADSHND" while it was very much a work in progress. Among the things she had me do was to compress the timeline significantly: Originally, the plot unfolded over about nine months.

Lee's argument was that it was impossible for Mulder to go that long without knowing where Scully was or what was happening to her. Even if he wouldn't go to her himself, she said, he'd get the Lone Gunmen to look in on her and report to him.

She was right. I condensed the timeline to about three months.

In another instance, Lee noticed that I hadn't wrapped up a minor subplot involving Bill Scully's latest tour of sea duty. I went back and added that in.

There were other instances where Lee caught me making a mistake, believe me. I owe her more than I can say.

Not everyone is willing to take on a beta-read of a 1MB novel, so if you don't already have more than one person who'll beta for you, you might want to get started looking for a second beta.

What happens when you finish your epic tome? (I jumped up and down and waved my hands in the air, crying out, "I finished it! I finished it!" which alarmed both my dogs and my husband, but that's not what I'm talking about here.)

If your readers have stayed with you thus far, they need resolution. That doesn't mean you have to answer every single question you've raised: They don't do that on the show, and it almost never happens in real life, either.

What you do have to do is bring the characters to a sense of finality, be it peace or sorrow. Really great drama leaves the reader feeling that the protagonists have encountered and resolved the greatest crisis of their lives. That can't happen every week in series television, but it can happen in your novel, and you should let it.

And so what if the resolution is that the entire world gets blown up except for Mulder and Scully? Next week, you can create a whole new universe with a whole new "greatest crisis" for our heroes to encounter and resolve.

That, after all, is the beauty of fic.

Best of luck with your novel, and be sure to drop me a line when you finish it.

Email: Jean Helms

My Fanfiction: http://www.angelfire.com/ms2/lovesurvives e.com/ms2/lovesurvives