Outlines

[Kael]

After losing two stories I was proud of to impossible plot conditions (realizing that halfway through writing the general idea I had in my head can't possible work) I've started outlining my future stories.

Which led me to wonder, do you guys do this? From reading about other novelists I kinda got the impression that they just wrote as they go (Steven King's bio being the prime example, though as Im not a fan of King maybe I shouldnt follow his technique).

If you do outline would you care to share examples of what you have done. Im doing my own crazed markup, but it would be nice to see what others consider valuable.

fyi: an example of my latest impossible wall is a story that halfway through is supposed to transition villians from the one that started the story to another. There is no connection between the villians, the original villian was simply in to setup the character and situation. Its a mess.

[Creole Ned]

I do not usually outline, for much the same reason that King writes about in On Writing.

To me the most engaging part of writing is seeing where things will go when you only have a very loose plan to begin with. Typically for an exercise or short story I will come up with a basic premise and maybe a rough sketch for a character or two (never written down), but from there I just start writing and see where the story goes. The outlining, such as it is, happens after the first draft is done, when I step back and look at what does and doesn't work in the finished piece.

I did actually write some notes for the last exercise ("Rainy Day") which is more than I usually do and gave the story more thought than I typically would. To give you an idea of what I had before I began writing, here are the notes:

- Benford Nuclear Power Plant
- Benford River
- Venting steam a year after shutdown
- Jim Albert investigates, comes back driving like maniac, truck crashes and explodes
- hermit doesn't come out for weekly shopping due to rain
- at end with storm/fire raging at nuke plant: The Weatherman was coming.

That's probably as close to an outline as I've written recently and we all know how the first draft of that story turned out. ;)

The downside of not outlining for me is some stories simply run aground. I have many unfinished attempts that progressed little beyond the "neat idea" phase, but that may reflect more my tendency to write around a plot device or hook instead of from a more character-driven POV. Sometimes, though, I have been able to pick up an incomplete story and finish it, like I did with "Follow the Tracks" in Exercise 15.

For my NaNoWriMo novel The Ferry I did have some specific characters and storyline plotted out in advance. I also knew how the story would end. As I wrote, most of those things got tossed aside, characters came to life in ways I didn't expect and the ending was completely different than what I had planned.

Outlining can be useful but I suspect for most writers it's something that either really works or really doesn't. For myself, I've never found it helped much.

[Kael]

Thats great to hear. I have these grand designs for my stories, I know the theme, I have a few scenes in my mind that I really want to write. I typically don't write without a clear idea for what the ending should be. Many times the last chapter is written first.

But I end up skewed halfway through. Unable to get the characters as they have developed to the ending I had envisioned, unable to stay on track with the themes I had imagined.

When I write without a clear plan I just ramble for worthless pages. I have to figure out that balance.

[Paladin]

I never outline, which may help to explain why I have such a hard time finishing stories. I generally start out with either a first sentence or last sentence in mind and build from there. Sometimes it works well, but mostly I end up with a strong beginning and/or ending and stuck for story in the middle. That's where I'm at with the current exercise. I have what I feel is a good beginning, and I know where I want to end up, but I could probably write the whole thing in a page and a half right now because I don't have any ideas for scenes to go in the middle.

[russellmz]

one new thing i'm trying to do is pretend to be a reviewer and write a quick "review" of my of my story before i set a word of the actual story down. i basically write what i want my story to do/have.

"...the thematically consistent catfight at the end was a perfect surprise climax*"


* okay, not my story. that was for aliens.