Inside my Novel Bullet Journal
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 8 ก.พ. 2025
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A complete flipthrough of the bullet journal I dedicate to my novel, North of the End! Hope it gives you some ideas for your own.
How to Create Your Own Novel Bullet Journal
• How to Organise Your N...
Creativity is a cycle by Emily Cheeseman
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This is the kind of thing I would buy and read... seriously. If an author wrote a book I had read and enjoyed, then said to me, "I can write you a book on how to write, or you can read all of my development material - but be warned, it's just a giant brain splurge of incomprehensible information," you can be damn sure I'm gonna go for the brain splurge.
Learning about a writers particular thought process is far more interesting to me than learning 'how to write!'
Ahh it's gorgeous!!! I wasn't sure I wanted to start a bullet journal but you've convinced me to give it a shot!!!!
I'm thinking of setting up a novel bullet journal myself, and this video is really helpful for thinking about what I might need to set up for that. Thank you for sharing!
I had never heard about bullet journals until two days ago when someone shared a spread from hers on the German NaNoWriMo forum. And now I am really eager to try it out myself and I have been watching videos on it for hours (where actually I probably should have been writing). But this is really the first really useful one I found on how to use it to plan and organize a novel. Thank you so much. I am not sure that bullet journaling is for me, but I will definitely give it a try.
oh my word! that's amazing. could never do it myself but wow it's really impressive
I had never even CONSIDERED using a bullet journal for writing, but this is honestly brilliant! I watched your How to Create Your Own Novel Bullet Journal first, and was very inspired! I'm also extremely curious about some of the writing tools/techniques you mentioned (plot embryo, "card game" character building, etc.) so you can bet your ass I'm going to check them out! I look forward to perusing your channel some more, and whenever I am able to get back to writing my own novel (one of many that never got anywhere) I will absolutely use a bullet journal and credit you for the idea! Keep up your fantastic work!
PS: I am very intrigued by your novel and cannot wait to read it! I also found your completed novel and will definitely read it when I get the chance!
I have watched a lot of videos about writer's journals and this is the most comprehensive method by far and I'm only revising my first draft! Thank you so much for sharing and I'll be sure to tag you on IG once I have set up my writer's bullet journal to my needs :)
Great novel bullet journal! This gives me ideas. Supergirl is one of my rewards. One of my favorite shows.
Great tips. I've never been a bullet journal person but I really like some of the things you used, especially the revisions/ getting off to beta's. Creative Blessings!
This is really helpful. I've devoted the amount of notepages for these type of technical entries, prior to my worldbuilding and character building info. You have fabulous ideas!
Yesssss!!! I’ve been wanting to see this!!
Thank you so much for making these videos! I’ve kind of started a novel bullet journal. The begging has tips and helpful ideas for writing and the second part will eventually be my novel. Character plot ideas
This is so amazing and useful. I've got a regular bujo and a "writer's grimoire," which is full of storycraft and magical/lore elements I want to refer back to. I've wanted a bujo strictly for my novel project for awhile, but didn't know how to approach it. I'm much earlier in the process than you, but I still think a lot of these spreads apply. Thank you so much for sharing!
Ahh, I love the idea of a writer’s grimoire!!
Yet again, your videos are helping me change my writing for the better. ^^ Thank you!
I checked out 4thewords during Nanowrimo last year, and I think i'll be using it for this year. :) it's super fun.
I love this. So inspiring and I'm seeing ways I could adapt your process for my own novel bullet journaling. Thanks for sharing!
Thanks, Rachel for this. I already use a bullet journal and will definitely be using one for my next project after having got into such a mess with my current WiP because I was so disorganised! I have vowed never to get into that position again.
Good luck with your reorganization!
Awesome video! :) I just started a writing specific bullet journal, and these spread ideas were super helpful! My writing bullet journal is currently housed in a travelers notebook with a separate insert for characters, plot, setting, and research/reference materials. I'm definitely going to add another insert for chapter spreads.
This was extremely helpful, thank you Rachael!
Amazingly helpful! Thank you!! :)
I like that you made a location bank. this kind of thing will be very useful in my project, as I intend to make a game after finishing my book/series project.
This is such a great idea :O I feel really inspired by your journal :)
Thanks. Your bullet journal is very inspiring. 😄😍
That was fun! Thanks for sharing. PS: Website looks good, just the right amount of pink, LOL.
I was looking forward to this one. Thanks!
These videos are great! Thank you!
omg... super helpful, thank you! watching this in 2021 haha
This is so exciting!
I might have to copy this... :) ;) It's so phooey on it beautiful! And not to mention productive! I have a regular bullet journal, but I might have to try this kind!!!!
Yay! Send pics on insta or Twitter if you do!
Your website looks great! Not "too pink" at all - as if there's such a thing. :) I'm watching your bullet journal videos out of order, but I'm really interested in starting one. It seems like a lot of work, but worth it. PS thanks for the heads up about 4thewords. Looks so cool. I'm a big gamer, so definitely going to check it out!
I love your website - and the colours are gorgeous. Mine ended up being cream and teal. Kinda boring... I should add purple.
Another great video!
Wonderful video! Thank you very much! :)
Your vids are great. I've been struggling with setting up a writing bullet journal and you've given some great ideas. Is there any chance of a video about the Revision Handbook and the Story Bible or Codex? Thanks for all your work!!
Do you still do this or did you stop? I love how you have it laid out and wondered if you have a updated video
i actually made this into an entire workshop to show my updated system! it’s called the story toolkit workshop and you can join for free on my website rachaelstephen.com ✌️
@@RachaelStephen oh ok awesome I will definitely do that!
Once you have numbered your scenes and chapters it seems like your notes lock that in. Do you ever find a tension here where you want to split, shuffle, merge or delete scenes? I like the freedom and physical form of written notes but I like the ability to easily shuffle and link things together you get from typed (using a wiki so I can have links, sub-pages and sections). My experience using this is all from other sorts of projects though - not story writing. Is there anything you can tell us about what you do if you what to shuffle scenes or why you never do?
PS thank you for your videos. I started using them to help teach my six year old writing craft. Now I've accidentally started planning my own children's/YA novel.
I am most curious what "Basic Witches", "Witchy Glitter Haul", and "Warbringer-WW) are in reference too. I have a feeling I know what Warbringer is but I don't want to assume :D
Oh, I am also a Virgo ^.~
Website's awesome! Not too pink at all - what?
This is so helpful! I really loved how you set this up; it's so pleasing and organized. I have a question though; would you suggest using one journal for both random ideas (for different stories) and a full novel run or use two separate journals (one for ideas, one for each full novel)?
Thanks for the awesome video!
I would have a spread for random ideas in my personal journal and have a seperate journal for the novel I’m working on. You only need the random ideas when deciding what to work on next.
Hi Rachael! I’m a big fan- What is the difference between a plot embryo and a main characters plot embryo- or is there a difference?
No difference except that you spend more time telling the story of a main character’s plot embryo.
Rachael Stephen 🙏 the reply made my scream (inside myself because I’m at work) Thank you! I made character embryos for two protagonists and two antagonists but they are totally bumping into each other right now- so I have to keep that all straight in my mind. Then I realized I actually had no OFFICIAL plot embryo- just the character ones. Love the channel so much- it appeals to my Virgo-Ian sense of order
:D just found your channel! Am I right in saying you're Scottish? I want to say so but I'm rubbish at detecting a fellow scot out of Scotland X)
Never mind! I can now tell from the locations 😂 I'm also in Glasgow!!
Thank you for all you do, I've decided to invest in a version of this that'll work for ME. I'm very worried about buggering up an expensive journal. And as a designer I use $0.98, gridded, comp books to do my wireframes. To overcome my intimidation I think I'll get a 3 ring binder with a zipper and print my own dot-grid pages. That way if I goof up making a page pretty or informative then I can just start again and not feel like I have to cut pages out of a sexy $30 journal.
Also, it may be nice to have this resource in the doobly-doo [ 88cupsoftea.com/podcast/sarahjmaas/ ] The link to the 88 cups of Tea interview.
What works for you works for you, and that's wonderful, but I'd rather be burned at the stake than write a novel that way. I'd be willing to be I've written and sold a novel to a mainstream publisher in far less time than you've spent on your novel bullet journal.
Only writing is writing. Planning, plotting, thinking about, etc., are not writing. Can't recall who sai dthat, but it's true. Writers who succeed nearly always follow Heinlein;s Rules For Writing, even if they've never heard of them.
Exceptions do happen. I did enough time as an editor to learn this, but they're pretty darned rare. You do sound like one of those exceptions, but I feel like my life is draining away fast just by thinking about a novel writing journal like yours. Granted, it certainly works for some, but send schills through me. It really does.
I sold quite a few novels, along with a big bunch of short stories, over a nearly forty year career, and my method was always the same. Sit down, drop what I hope is an interesting character into what I hope is an interesting situation, and then see how he or she gets out of it. No planning, no plotting, no character development, etc. Just write. I don't even want to know what happens on the next page until I write it, and I don't want to know who any of the characters are until I write them into a scene.
Writers have been writing this way for centuries, but the literati took over mid-twentieth century, and suddenly we needed outlines, character sheets, plotting, planning, and you name it, just to put a human being into a story and write it all down.
Even after forty years, character development still makes no sense at all to me. Nor character profiles, character interviews, character personalities, etc. These just create Frankenstein's monsters that are nothing like real people.
Why create character when you have, at the very least, fifty people, fifty REAL peole, who will be equally real in a work of fiction? And probably a hundred, or five hundred, or five thousand, than to cable TV and TH-cam that you could use.
But, sadly, most characters in fiction are too impossibly handsome/beautiful, virile, Superman/Superwoman to interest me, anyway. Sturgeon's Law at work, I guess. Ninety percent of everything is crud. And, yes, the correct word is "crud", not "crap". Several of Sturgeon's writer friends tried to correct this, but no one listened then, and it's certain no one listens on the internet.
Anyway, I have known a few writers, a very few, that your method worked for, but it's beyond me how. They all had the kind of Frankenstein's monster characters I don't care for, but this is what some novels in every genre demand, and what you have to do to write them.