Notebook of Awesomeness

Have you ever kept a notebook next to you to write down everything you think of a specific novel or short story?  Then you, my friend, have kept a notebook of awesomeness.

Years ago I bought a composition notebook for 50 cents at the dollar store.  Inside that notebook I composed my first novel.  It was poorly written and had the spelling errors and lack of depth you would expect of a 9 year old, but boy was I so proud!  And thus the idea of the notebook of awesomeness was born.

So what all do you put in the notebook?  Anything and everything related to your story.  And each story gets it's own notebook, so you don't confused ideas. 
 
 Inside my current novel notebook I have pages dedicated for each of the 3 main characters, then a page for scenery, a page that explains small things about the new planet they are on, a page that outlines the entire story, a page that I just write scrap ideas, and a page that gives the moral of the story.  Everything has a page so that I can easily find scrap ideas and expand on them as well as make minor changes to my characters while still keeping everything centrally located.

Random page in my notebook

It also gives me a chance to write down an idea and then scrap it later.  In the above picture you'll see a but of NO written around the page.  Those were ideas that I threw around in my head and wanted to write out, but once I got them down on paper I didn't like the ideas all that much, so I abandoned them.  I never scratch them out, however, so I can always remember that those ideas didn't really work.  Alternatively, it gives me a chance to revisit these ideas later if I need to spice things up a little. 

Character sketch from the notebook

I love having everything centrally located.  It saves me from having to pull up my file on the my computer in order to remember how old one of my character is or where they were born.  It makes the quick writing I do that much quicker.  It also allows me to write down any information I want to explore about that character. 

I love my notebook of awesomeness!

Until Next Time