Yes, amazingly enough, I've posted two entries in one day. Don't worry, Erin, this will be it for now.
I've read a lot of arguments on one side or the other of the "Plotter vs. Pantser" debate, and so far, they've only served to increase my frustration.
Each side has valid arguments. The trouble is, I've tried both approaches, and get equally bogged down with each one--just in different ways.
If I go the "Plotter" route, "preparation paralysis" sets in (a wonderful phrase I picked from the myriad books on writing I've read so far). I try so hard to get the characters and plot fully fleshed out from the beginning that I freeze and nothing gets done.
Yet if I go the full "Pantser" route, I end up wandering so far from the original point of my story that I...well, freeze and nothing gets done.
The only thing that has seemed to work for me so far is the 500-word stories I do for the Mixed Tape.
Why? Perhaps because the pressure is off--I don't have to worry over developing a story or its characters beyond one simple scene, and can get away with giving the readers only as many details as absolutely necessary. Not as much research is required, since I'm not having to create a complex world for my characters to inhabit. Just set up a quick conflict, and resolve the conflict in 500 words or less.
I enjoy writing the shorter stories, but I feel a bit like a racehorse that's been hobbled. I'd love to break loose and show what I can do, but don't know how to do it without paralysis setting in once again.
I'm leaning more toward the "Pantser" direction, because that at least ensures I get something written, even if it rambles all over creation. That said, I'd like to ask the self-professed "Pantsers" here to advise me on how to avoid letting my stories wander too far afield.
Comments
Pantser (or seat-of-knickers flying)
How about settling the end then sprinkling jokes/scenes (or 500 word short stories in your case) over a landscape without plot and then trying to navigate from the one you subsequently entitle Chapter 1 to the next that catches your fancy. As an avid fan of Angharad's Bike I am convinced that some days she followers the trail left by the 'One-liner Fairy' and the results are spectacular.
Even though I've had to put my writing on hold for a while I do know the end and several scenes before of The Transit of Venus a book-and-a-half in the future.
Rhona McCloud
I Figured You Knew Where You Were Headed ...
…, with the story, Rhona. But I wondered if you'd gotten so far off track that you were holding things up until you could find your way back.
Eric
A series of 500-word scenes...
...strung together? Is that what you mean? And do you have the ending fully written first?
Livin' A Ragtime Life,
Rachel
Joining the moments of inspiration
I think it unrealistic to have the final scene completely written Rachel but dates, place, most characters and finale in mine are set as it seems easier for me to be creative within boundaries. When you have moments of inspiration for 'shorts' I think it will prove natural to limit your palette of characters and create a time-line of sorts to make the end possible. I have assumed a real world story as time-travel and morphing characters are beyond my capability.
Rhona McCloud
I'm Definitely Pantser
Well, my own experience, at least for something not very short: at best I might do a very gross outline or timeline, and label certain events without much detail. Once I try anything more detailed than that, my mind scrambles. Then write (or even just coarsely describe) various scenes. Think small. Also, jot into a separate ideas file anything you think of but can't write right off the bat. If you forget them, you might be reminded by occasionally skimming the ideas file. You might even write things down about characters that won't make the story, but tell you a bit more about them.
You might get into a state where your characters control you, rather than you control your characters. That means your characters have become real.
At some point, you fill things in, make connections, cut things out. (Save what you cut out, please!) One major scene was cut from my long story, but it has become a scene (rather different) in the sequel. I cut out another huge event (long before it was ready to go to Elrod) while I still had delusions of grandeur about the scale of the July 4th celebration. I cut it out, simply because I decided Grandmother and Anya simply wouldn't do it. Given his complaint about the draft he got, that way too many people knew about BB transformations, he surely would have had a cow at that event.
Revise, revise, revise. After finishing a first draft which might be rather messy, sloppy, etc., maybe put it aside for two or three weeks. Then revise. Steven Pinker (facetiously): "The world is coming to an end! Our youth aren't revising enough!"
Finally, you hopefully end up with something that bears some resemblance to your initial vision. (It might even be improved.)
-- Daphne Xu (a page of contents)
Targets
I'm a seat-of-the pantser usually, although I have written stories where I said, "This WILL be five chapters" and more or less stuck to that...
My current epic tells it's own tale of pantsing getting out of control. Somewhere Else Entirely is at least twice the size I originally intended but it is coming to a conclusion now. When I began I knew very roughly what would happen along the way and the ending has been planned out in my head right from the start. I think that's important.
Unfortunately, I was a little too enthusiastic... My readers seem to like what I'm doing, though, so I'm keeping them happy while getting to the point where... well, you'll just have to wait and see, won't you?
On the other hand, The State Does Not Make Mistakes was strange. When I started writing chapter one I had no idea where it was going or even how I was going to arrange the inadvertant transition. Everything was literally made up as I went along. That story was six chapters, and then I realised I had only scratched the surface so there are now twenty-eight. Even now, I don't think I have finished with Marion and Belle. Ho-hum.
I think, with pantsing, it is essential to have an idea of the overall story arc. Boy (girl) enters strange country, girl meets Prince, girl marries Prince... And then there might just be other stories interwoven with the main romance which explain what is happening and why.
To have a completely open-ended story is just inviting trouble. I sometimes suspect that is one reason we have so many unfinished stories here: the authors had a good idea and began writing, but didn't know where it was all going and became discouraged. Not a good plan.
Penny
Target
I think it is a good idea to have a target ending. I did have a target, although it was so far back I don't remember. My envisioned ending changed a few times, although I think my penultimate target -- confrontation with Grandmother -- remained.
-- Daphne Xu (a page of contents)
When i start a new project
I often have a target finish in mind but getting there can be a nightmare!
My big cereal (food on the brain!) I mean serial, Gaby is written with much smaller targets in mind and sometimes I struggle to reach those! Often the plot I've got planned for a 40 chapter 'book' over runs somewhat - the last three books were originally planned plot wise to span just one volume! Of course the other problem with Gaby is that there is no overall plan for the series, no 'it will finish when' scenario - its open ended so whilst I have plot markers I don't have a time table.
Nena on the OH is written as a series of loosely connected but standalone tales, its very formulaic, the big question usually is what silly situation will the heroine end up in this time.
Something I do find that works for me is writing time and a deadline. Doesn't mean I write for the whole allocated time (typically 2 hours each evening) nor that I always make the deadline but having some structure in this respect stops me zoning out and getting too distracted with other stuff.
Madeline Anafrid Bell