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Baking the Novel
My kids gave me a breadmaker one Christmas. It is a wonderful thing when your kids get rich enough to give you expensive presents--it makes you feel secure about your old age Anyway, here was this breadmaker, for someone who had never made a successful loaf of bread in her life. And it really works the way it's supposed to, you throw in the water and the flour and the shortening and the salt and sugar and dried milk and yeast and you turn it on and four hours later you have a perfect loaf of bread.
Well, not always perfect. One of my first loaves was flat and heavy and had a unicorn horn growing out of the top. One loaf was almost triangular; another tasted like styrofoam.
Before long, I realized that bread-making isn't as simple as it first appears, even with a machine. You need certain types of flour; all-purpose flour isn't always the right kind. You can't cut down on the sugar or salt too much or the yeast won't work. If you use bran, it has to be the right kind of bran.
By now, you may have guessed I'm talking not only about breadmaking, but about writing a novel. Some non-writers think all you have to do is toss the basic ingredients into your imagination, sit down at the keyboard and write a few sentences without involving your brain at all. You and I know this is not so. Novelists have to be selective about the ingredients they use. The success of the novel you write will depend upon the quality of the ingredients you use. Toss in a few cliched characters and stereotypical situations and you will have a humdrum story. But stir in some exciting, original, three-dimensional characters and some unusual but believable situations, make sure conflict and action are motivated and believable, bring in an interesting setting as background, and you could have a blockbuster.
Just as caraway seeds or sesame seeds in my breadmaker add to the flavor of the loaf, imagery and symbolism add to the flavor of your novel. Don't neglect metaphors. Don't overdo them either. And try to come up with fresh original similes. Not "blue as the sky," but "blue as the light seen through snow." Not "white as fleece clouds," but "puffs of white clouds like designs painted on Chinese porcelain."
Symbols can add a great deal to your mix too. I once wrote about a downhill skier who always wore a cowboy hat on the slopes. The woman he was interested in thought this was a bit of an affectation, until she learned the hat had belonged to his father, one of the few things saved when his father was killed in a fire. Symbols, used sparingly and with freshness, can be powerful.
There it is then, the baking, or making, of a novel. Use quality ingredients, fresh ingredients, original ingredients, and mix with loving care.