HOW TO WRITE A PRETTY DAMN GOOD NOVEL

Novelist and writing instructor James N. Frey has a confession that must be reassuring to his students.

"I had a lot of trouble learning how to write," he says.

Hoping to clarify the techniques for himself, Frey decided to write about writing. The eventual result was his book "How to Write a Damn Good Novel," which was followed by "How to Write a Damn Good Novel II, Advanced Techniques." Both are widely-read guides for aspiring writers.

Frey will conduct a writing workshop from 8 a.m.-4:30 p.m. Saturday at the University Center. The workshop is sponsored by the Heartland Writers Guild. For more information, phone (573) 545-3286.

Frey teaches novel writing at the University of California, Berkeley, Extension. In a phone interview, he said his aim is to inspire would-be novelists and show them a path that can lead to a book.

Plotting will be an essential part of Frey's presentation Saturday. "Plotting is the hardest thing for writers to do," he says. "They focus on words, there is a concentration on language. They also write from life. But life doesn't have good plots."

A staffer at the highly regarded Squaw Valley Writers' Conference, Frey sometimes conducts one-day workshops devoted entirely to plotting.

Creating an interesting protagonist is another problem for beginning writers. That's because most writers are people who tend to observe and think and imagine rather than act, Frey says.

"They don't want to get into the ring with Muhammad Ali. But they can create a character like that."

Workshop participants will be shown how to create characters "off the end of the bell curve. Exaggerated characters, dramatic types you put in conflict with one who's an opposite," he said.

Just such step-by-step techniques can produce a novel, Frey said. "Most people have an idea first. This will show how to start with characters and get an idea later."

A number of Frey students have seen their novels published. Margaret Cuthbert, an obstetrician who writes medical thrillers, just signed a two-book deal for $2 million. Her first book will be titled "Silent Cradle." The second hasn't been written yet.

Becoming a novelist is a numbers game, Frey tells his students. One student queried 104 agents before landing one, but that agent was a top gun.

Frey himself wrote six unpublished manuscripts before his first one found a publisher.

The trials can be self-imposed, too. Would-be novelists have a well-known tendency to quit while writing their last draft, he says.

"They know if they finish it they will have to face a query letter and agent. They can't take the rejection. This book in some ways represented their psyche."

But that's why fiction writing is more rewarding than nonfiction, Frey says. "It is a map of your own psychology.

A novel is written "a day at a time," Frey says. "Most dedicated people are working three to four hours a day at the same time every day. Once you get into the groove, if you take the night off you feel horrible."

Inevitably, Frey thinks of his approach to novel writing in metaphoric terms. "Your imagination and talent are the gunpowder. Craft is the cannon," he says. "There are some people who don't need a cannon. Most people do."

And how many of his nine novels have been damn good?

"I think I have written three really good ones," he said.