Besides writing an outline for a book, it is important to keep characters straight. Doing a family tree and a character list help. That way there won’t be too many Tom’s for instance. Part of the character list is also a physical description of the character and how they relate to each other. We have also been keeping track of ship names as well as those for inns. When writing a series, some of the same landmarks may be used from book to book. Click here to see how we do a family tree to help keep our characters straight.