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I've been doing a lot of reading about outlining lately, and the more I read, the more intimidated I feel. I have no idea where the first, second, and whatever plot points fall in my stories, nor am I aware of the pinch points. I'm not all that sure I understand what "pinch points" are. I'm expected to do all this and write character bios before I put one single word of my story on paper (or whatever medium I prefer to use). One site said the pre-writing process should take months. Months! I don't know how, following that method, I could get anything written. I think I know now why I do so much better with the 500 word stories. I can keep the structure in my head.
Is there anyone else who goes through the trouble of character bios, writing down all the plot points, pinch points and so on? If so, how long does it normally take you to do?
Winging it is what I do
I fly by the seat of my pants, winging it the whole way. Sometimes I'm halfway through the outline and I don't even know the main characters name, and maybe half of their background.
What I always do is outline. It's my way of making sure I have a story. And even then, halfway through the story, I may realize I need to go back and add or take away stuff before I continue.
I wouldn't worry too much about following those instructions. If it doesn't get your writing accomplished, try something different.
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Neither
I do neither character bios, nor outline. I've tried to outline stories before and what happens to me is that I workout where the story is going and what order it all follows to get there and at the point where a "professional" writer would begin fleshing out the storyline, I've lost all interest in writing it. I know everything I hoped to know about writing that story.
I know I'm a long way from a good fiction writer, but I prefer to fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants when writing fiction. The thrill of the story (for me) that I write is seeing just where it goes and how it develops. If I outline it that's all done and I really don't care if I write it.
I think that you should have a good idea of how the story end and what the back story for each of the main characters is. Jotting down the back story might be worthwhile on longer works, so you can check back to see that you don't have the character doing something against their nature.
Hugs
Patricia
Happiness is being all dressed up and HAVING some place to go.
Semper in femineo gerunt
Ich bin eine Mann
Pre-writing is just one route to take.
There are plenty of authors who simply write their stories as they go along, and no, I'm not just talking about internet fiction writers either. And as for pre-writing taking months even if you do it, well, tell that to an authoress like Nora Roberts, who cranks out multiple books a year!
For me, writing is something most often done off the cuff. It's one thing to have an idea of what you want to do before you start, though even that isn't really necessary in all situations, and another to write your story before you ever write the first actual word of the story. The same goes for laying out all the major plot points and such that people who subscribe to a formulaic method of writing rely on: it's all dependent on you, as the author, and how you feel you want the story to go.
Sit back with a nice cup of Earl Grey, play a little Frank Sinatra, and relax. Think about what you want to do with the story. Think about who your main character is, who they perceive the other characters to be, and about the events that unfold around them.
Done that? Good.
Now. Start writing. You could be writing a quick draft of events, or bios, or just an outline, whatever you feel you should work on. I recommend having at least two word processor windows open: one for "story" work, and one for notes, or an outline, or whatever else you want. I typically use a combination of OpenOffice for my actual writing surface and a generic plaintext document for everything else. Using a higher powered program for the primary document gives me a bit more formatting freedom, which can be handy for adding emphasis or even picking a typeface that keeps you inspired to write, while using plaintext for everything else prevents you from agonizing over the exact same thing while doing the equivalent of bullet lists and the like.
That's all you have to do. Write what you feel like, where you feel it needs to be. This isn't the day of typewriters, where a single mistake or change of opinion leads to hours of wasted effort and expensive paper and ribbon. Digital documents can be edited, sliced, diced, copied, colored, deleted, and anything else you want with a minimum amount of expense or effort. Just... write. Skip back and forth, making notes on the side while working on the story too -- widescreen monitors are great for having two documents side by side like that. Get lost in coming up with events for a while, or characters, but then skip over and start a new chapter head when you want to write more creatively or have an idea for something you just HAVE to get down. Heck, write the entire story, then let it sit for a week, re-read it, and re-type it in a new window as you do, fixing continuity errors, or adding bits, or changing them as you go along.
There is no one correct (or incorrect) way to go about writing. Writing creatively is not the same as writing for a grade, or for a business. Nobody is going to mark points off because you didn't show your work, or because you came to a different conclusion than they did.
Write however feels comfortable to you.
I'll start with two documents, like I said above, and usually either a title, a blurb about the plot I have in mind, or simply an opening line. From there I'll start writing. Characters will get listed either in the spare document or just at the bottom of my main as I introduce them, and the same goes for major plot points or things I know will mess with continuity, like class schedules, or dates. If I have things pop in my head for later I don't wanna lose, the same goes for them, but for the most part my stories usually develop pretty linearly for me. I might have a rough idea of an ending in mind when I start most things, but I typically write the story in a straight line from beginning to end, letting events unfold for me as they appear on the page, and letting the split-second decisions of my characters be just that, split second decisions that could drastically change the way things go. That's only one way of writing, though, and admittedly a way that many people would tell you is asinine and prone to leaving things unfinished (which it is, admittedly.)
Don't use someone else's method. Take influences from it, sure, but let your own personality lead you to the method of writing that works for you. If it is frustrating, or intimidating, or boring, then it isn't the method you need to use.
Melanie E.
My method is similar.
My method is similar. About the only real difference is that I have stopped worrying about writing it in order, start to finish. I find that when a particular scene comes to mind I am better off writing it then and there and worrying about correct chronological placement when the story actually works to the point that scene fits right.
Stupidity is a capital offense. A summary not indictable.
I don't necessarily do it by choice :P
When I write I tend to "watch" my stories unfold in my head. I may write from a first-person view most of the time, but I actually experience most of my stories as though they were a television show, complete with dynamic camera angles and everything. It's part of the reason I don't spend nearly as much time as I probably should on details of appearance and location in a lot of my stories as I should: when I'm experiencing it in my head, all that stuff isn't part of the narrative so much as just background information told visually by my brain.
I spend a lot of time wishing I just had a device I could hook up to my head and drain stories, music, and game ideas out with. It would be a heckuva lot easier to share things with the world if I could.
Melanie E.
Plotter versus Pantser
Ah yes, the ever ongoing debate of Plotter versus Pantser. Whichever works best for you is the right way to write.
If you're going to do something epic, a six book 100K words per book series with a dozen story arcs going on and plenty of detailed world building, yeah, you might take some time to build the world and story framework ahead of time. It's rather embarrassing, not to mention a lot of reworking when your beta reader points out that a second level character that you last saw a hundred pages ago suddenly changed from a four foot two inch dark haired hobbit into a six foot female elf with long white tresses and no explanation as to how'd that happen.
Guilty!
I fully admit, my epic is exactly what you describe.
Wait, what? A six foot female elf, you say?
I tried making an outline for a story
just killed the idea dead.
Architects vs Gardners
There are a lot of writers out there who make the incorrect assumption that if a story isn't plotted out and anoted before hand that it's somehow inferior to one that is. There are drawback to either approach, but the main key is finding which one works for you. That being said, I have read stories that have meandering plots, and while that's often blamed on the lack of an outline I think the real culprit is a lack of direction. Some authors find their direction by outlining others take different routes. Before I write I tend to work out a plot in my head, and while it does grow and change quite a lot by the time I finish the story, I don't believe it can be said my plots wander.
In short, outline if it works for you and don't let the opinions of others sway what genuinly works best for you.
There's a story I recall reading, a young fantasy author (I believe it was Terry Brooks) at a writer's confrence give an impassioned speech about the importance of outlining and why it's essential for every writer. When he sits down (next to Anne McCaffrey no less) she tells him something that really surprises him. Basically, McCaffrey says that she hadn't outlined a day in her life. McCaffrey isn't the only one there are other author's who use a no-outline approach (including George R.R. Martin) and they certainly have seen a great deal of success.
I'm going to leave with this quote from Mr. Martin which really drives home main differences between the two approaches: “I think there are two types of writers, the architects and the gardeners. The architects plan everything ahead of time, like an architect building a house. They know how many rooms are going to be in the house, what kind of roof they're going to have, where the wires are going to run, what kind of plumbing there's going to be. They have the whole thing designed and blueprinted out before they even nail the first board up. The gardeners dig a hole, drop in a seed and water it. They kind of know what seed it is, they know if planted a fantasy seed or mystery seed or whatever. But as the plant comes up and they water it, they don't know how many branches it's going to have, they find out as it grows. And I'm much more a gardener than an architect.”
Have delightfully devious day,
Just Write
A lot of that is crap. Just write. If by any chance you imagine a character with a backstory or a bio, by all means jot it down to the extent you can -- to avoid forgetting it. Jot down ideas you get before forgetting them also -- either where they occur in your story, or in a separate ideas file. If you have specific plot points or incidents in mind, jot them down approximately where they go in the story.
I think short stories can simply be written, put side, revised, then published.
As for longer stories in my experience (sample size of one, perhaps almost two, within the past decade): just write and keep writing, things you think should happen. You'll have an incoherent mess for a long time, but it eventually comes together (maybe -- as I said, I've a sample size of one). Perhaps work hard to fill things in. Sometimes a character takes over -- that makes things easier for you. (Or much harder, if she's going where you don't want to go.)
Then put it aside, for a couple weeks. Then revise heavily, and write more. (Stuff from the chopping block should be stored away, where one might use it later, at least for ideas.) I've had to cut out whole events, realizing that they wouldn't have happened -- even before sending my story to Elrod for approval.
Of course, if you publish or post sections before finishing the entire story, revision becomes a different issue.
-- Daphne Xu
It depends...
Generally speaking, when I get a new story idea in mind, I'll just pop open a word processor and start writing. This works well enough for shorter stories that I can complete in a few sittings (c.f. the three stories I've posted ^_~ ). I can map things out in my head and keep them straight long enough to do the job. Although in "Titanium"'s case, I was actually following the events of a music video, so that basically acted as an "outline" for me.
For the two longer pieces I've got in the works, I've started jotting notes down about characters to make sure I keep them consistent between writing sessions. I don't have full bios written out or anything, but just stuff like "plays World of Warcraft" or "reformed Juvinile Delinquent", as well as maybe age and/or appearence notes if I don't think I'll be able to recall them or if I want to make sure they work in the story timeline. This is sort of an organic process; I'll add to the notes as I write and update with character information that I've added (or decided on). I did do a bit of advance character- and setting-plotting with one of the two stories, though, since the setting's a bit more complicated and there were details I needed to nail down before I could introduce them.
As far as the actual writing process goes, with the longer pieces, I'll generally work out the gist of a scene in my head over a few days, then sit down and write it once I'm comfortable with how it goes. If the scene I'm writing is jumped ahead of where the main body of the story currently is, I'll either set it aside to figure out where to include it later, or, if I already know where it fits, I'll put a few notes or a short timeline of what needs to be filled in to connect the two.
So it might be:
{...end of already-written scene}
- breakfast
- meet with [character]
= ask about [X]
- head to mall
{start of already-written scene...}
Once I know what I need to fill in, I'll use that to "seed" my brain and start the mull-then-write process over again. It's not super-important that I map out exactly what I will be doing in advance, I'm just making sure I've got all the major bits in. With that example outline, maybe I'll decide to cut the breakfast scene. Maybe I'll just roll the whole transition into one scene where the two characters meet at the mall for breakfast and discuss [X]. If I have an idea I might want to try when I'm writing, I'll throw that on the outline as well ("wallet gets stolen?"), and when I'm actually writing the scene, I'll decide whether I want to explore that option then, move it elsewhere, or cut it.
Depending on the story, I might outline a bit in advance as well, especially with a more complicated plot or one where I want to foreshadow future events. Again, it's nothing strict or formal, just a signpost of where I'm planning on going. Of course, given the rate of progress on my longer stories (one of which is coming up on its fourth birthday -- yikes!), maybe I should look into a more formal outline process!
This is getting long, so I'll wrap it here. Suffice to say, though, that each writer's process is unique as the writer. The only way to do it "wrong" is not to write at all. Good luck!