Ideas for a book almost never arrive while you're writing it. They come on the train, in the shower, from a stranger at the next table. If you don't catch them, they're gone. If you catch them in five different places, they might as well be.
This is a simple system for collecting the raw material of a book so it's there when you sit down to work.
One place per book
Keep everything for one project together: characters, scenes, research, stray lines. A single place for the book means you never wonder where you put that thing about the lighthouse.
If you're carrying ideas for two books, keep them apart. It's tempting to have one big "writing ideas" pile, but in a big pile it's hard to find anything again.
Characters
For each character, note what they want, what they're afraid of and how they talk. Those three things carry most of a character. Physical details can come later.
Write down where the character came from too. "Lighthouse keeper's daughter, came to me on the train" sounds pointless, but it helps you remember the original spark when the character starts drifting.
Scenes
Scenes often show up as a single image. A woman climbing a tower in the wind. Capture the image and whatever you know about it, even if you don't know where it goes yet. Add a guess about its place in the book if you have one: beginning, middle, end.
Don't try to write the scene in your notes. A few sentences is enough to rebuild it later.
If a second version of a scene shows up, keep both. The newer idea isn't automatically the better one.
Lines you overhear
Real people say things you'd never invent. When you hear a line worth keeping, write it down exactly, immediately. Paraphrased dialogue loses whatever made it good.
Note who might say it in your book. A line that already belongs to a character is much more likely to make it into the draft.
Names and places
Names are hard to invent on the spot and easy to collect. When you see a good one on a street sign, a gravestone or an old shop front, note it with where you saw it.
Same with places. A run-down pier, a kitchen with green tiles, the smell of a ferry. Real details make invented places feel lived in.
Research questions
Keep research as questions next to the thing they're about. "How did lighthouse lamps work around 1900?" sits with the scene that needs it.
Don't stop writing to research. Leave the question and keep going. Collect the answers in one sitting later.
When the book changes under you
Sometimes a note changes everything. A character's fear turns out to be something else, and the ending moves. Write those moments down with the reason. When you're revising, you'll want to know why the book became what it is.
Before you sit down to write
Read through what's come in since your last session. It takes a few minutes and it's one of the best warm-ups there is. You'll often find the next scene already waiting. Pick one note to start from, so you never begin with a blank page.
Where Nave fits
Talking on a crowded train is awkward, so wait for the platform, the walk home or the parking lot. Saying one sentence there is quicker than finding the right document. Nave files it with the rest of the book in one thread and picks out the to-dos, like the thing you need to look up.
Here's an invented novel, four notes in.
