Outline, Outline, Outline
This is the mantra that’s been swimming around my head for the last week.
I’ve always been a bit of a Polly Pants-er when it comes to writing, the kind that just goes with it and doesn’t try to dictate or plan where a story goes. This is why I was approaching 20,000 words on my novel without having a clear idea where it was going.
I had what you would call a General Sketch or vague notion of how the story would end up and what events would get me there, but that was it. I had no plans for actual scenes (beyond the ones that flowed when the idea for the story first came to me), no ancillary characters planned beyond the three main ones and no clear theme in mind.
I always thought outlining was a bit dull, a bit complicated, time-consuming and – frankly – unnecessary to the entire process. I figured, I know my story, it’s there in my head, I’ll do the research and it’ll all come out, right?
Wrong.
Outlining is pretty frickin’ integral.
Ever since I began this novel, I’ve been surfing various writer blogs for tips and lessons and such, and I came across a site called Wordplay by a writer named K.M. Weiland. I found her blog so helpful that I ended up getting her book on outlining a novel.
Aside from being a short and easy read, it was full of great tips and guidelines for creating a workable outline for your book. I finished it in two sittings and started applying it immediately.
Boy, has it helped!
Especially with my characters, initially I had about four or five lines written down to describe each one. But when I applied her Character Interview exercise, I would end up with five or six pages for each of my main characters. I discovered so much that I’ve since been able to express through scene ideas and potential dialogue to help move the story along.
It also gave me avenues to explore in terms of adding depth to my secondary characters which were beginning to feel a little bland and two-dimensional. I kept asking “What if?” and starting all my sentences with “Maybe”, and it just opened up this whole world of possible back story and motivation for my characters’ actions.
I also started pinpointing my ‘Big Moments’ and how I would approach them — whose POV to use, how it would affect my protagonist, what it would lead to in the next scene. I have my ‘Inciting Event’ in place, and it occurs at roughly a quarter of the way into the novel, which I’m given to understand is where it should be placed.
Acts I and II are almost entirely mapped out, in terms of knowing exactly what scenes will be included. But I am still just on general sketches for Acts III and IV (which might end up getting merged into one… I’m not sure yet.) I think I’m stuck here mainly because that’s where the action begins to take place and I still need to do a bit of research, which hopefully will help me pin down my scenes.
The only problem I’m facing is stopping my writing in order to outline properly. What I understand from the reading I’ve done is that you should have your outline fully in place before you begin actually writing. But it just seems odd and counter-intuitive; doing the outline is inspiring dialogue and exposition that I have no choice but to put down. I’m trying to confine myself to letting this happen in Acts I and II since they’re mostly done, but even if I get hit with inspiration for a scene that’s meant to happen later on, I will probably go ahead and write it down. I can always go back and re-write or delete it completely later on…
What do you guys do? Are you Olly Outliners or Polly Pants-ers? Do you completely nail down your outline before writing or let them both happen concurrently?
Disclaimer: I am not affiliated with K.M. Weiland in any way.
I absolutely cannot outline. I find trying to sit down and plan a novel to be like trying to break down a brick wall with a rubber toothpick. But, I don’t really find I have a need to outline either. I like to have an idea of the main character in my head, and roughly what the story is (but again, only in my mind, and only a single sentence type synopsis), but this usually ends up changing as I progress. In fact, I’ve reached that point with my NaNoWriMo novel from last year. I like just taking a character and seeing what stuff happens to them.
Having said that, I’m working on a sitcom at the moment, and I find that when writing scripts outlining becomes so much more important to help the scenes take shape. I think it’s because you’ve got to work the story and comic moments into essentially the same place, so it helps to know exactly where you need to end up by the end of the page/scene.
Never found the same with writing though, and have never broken down a piece into individual scenes before.
Thanks for the reply 🙂
I’ve been wanting to try NaNoWriMo and see whether I can do it or not :p
I guess it all comes down to the writer; I’m sure there are plenty of people who can just write without having to plan things out, but I don’t think I’m one of them.
It’s just that I get mired in, say, Chapter 3 and I start thinking ‘Oh my God, this is impossible,’ and ‘It’s never going to get done.’ But then I can look over at my corkboard and see my plan for the rest of the chapters and I’ll be like ‘Ooh, if I get through this, Chapter 7 will come up and it’s gonna be fun’! You know? :p
I guess what I’m saying is it’s just nice to be able to see where I’m going.
I can understand your point about sitcoms though as they tend to be very precisely structured and timed.
Good luck!
At your suggestion, I bought Weiland’s book yesterday in ebook format. I’ve only read a couple of chapters, but so far it’s been very helpful. Thanks again.
No problem 🙂 I hope you find it useful 😀 and I hope your story’s coming along okay!
Keep up the good work! 😀
Outlining saves me so much time and energy I can’t imagine writing without one.
I’m beginning to see its purpose as I go about doing it. It’s helpful to be able to see my whole plan on paper instead of just having it in my head..
Good luck and thanks for the comment! 🙂