Novels have been capturing the imagination of readers and taking them into worlds of their own for centuries. There are a lot of novel genres, including romance, science fiction, fantasy, mystery, thrillers and others. There are also subgenres such as historical romance that many people aren’t even aware of.
Today novels attract more writers than any other forms of creative writing. They all have elements that are key to every kind of novel. These elements are the following: theme, plot, setting, characters and dialogues between them. Different authors use these elements in different ways. Some prefer to pay a lot of attention to a theme and a setting. Others start with a character and develop a story by providing readers with insights into the character. While the elements can interact with each other in a countless number of ways, it is important for all of them to be present in a novel, be strong and work smoothly together with other elements.
While every novel has a theme, the theme is often not stated but revealed throughout the story. Often themes involve insights about life, relationships, and feelings that characters of stories discover through the situations they have to deal with and the way they react to these situations.
Novel characters need to be believable and enjoyable, even if they are villains. Flat characters can’t make a novel an exciting read. No matter how strong the other elements of a novel, boring characters will make the readers become bored or confused.
Characters of novels do not have to be human. They can be animals or machines or ghosts. Whatever they are, they need to seem real to the readers with personalities and quirks and wills of their own.