Yes. No. Maybe. Sometimes.
I almost never do an outline for anything shorter than 10,000 words because I can write the story faster than I can do a good outline.
And I frequently start even much longer works without a written outline. Currently, I am writing the serial Jane and I do not have an outline written down even though the story is already 32,000 words and is planned to be in excess of 40 or 50K. I have an outline in my head, but I don't have it written down.
Why not?
As I said above, writing an outline is sometimes as much effort as writing 10,000 words. And at this point in the project, I would just as soon have three more chapters written as to have an outline. Why am I an idiot for doing it this way? Well, I just am.
The advantages of doing an outline:
- Thinking about story problems ahead of time can help you avoid deadends and big rewrites.
- A good outline will help you keep characters, scenes, plot, and sequence in good order.
- It will give you a place to look and remind yourself, just what color were Phyllis's eyes? (Yes, I do include info like that in an outline.)
- A good outline will help you get back on track if you are forced into a writing hiatus. The internet is littered with stories abandoned by authors who suffered a hiatus and could not recover their mental outline or the energy to continue their work. This is why I am an idiot, see above.
- An outline can serve as a crutch for your limping muse, it's amazing the fresh ideas I often come up with in the middle of doing an outline for a story I could not jumpstart otherwise.
- An outline can enable you to write the hard parts first, to get them out of the way. Or the easy parts first, to enjoy getting them out of the way. Yes, when I have an outline, I do not necessarily write the story in the order it will be read.
The disadvantages of doing an outline:
- It's a lot of work that you may not need to do.
- An outline can straitjacket a story, keeping your mind in a channel that may not be as productive and original as you could be without one.
- An outline can kill a story. This is my big fail, without an outline I sometimes never finish a long story. With an outline, I sometimes never start. For all the unfinished stories by me out there (and there are more than you realize since I use several pennames), there are almost as many outlines for stories stillborn lurking on my hard drives. After all, I've already developed that story to a conclusion and no one is paying me to actually write the thing.
- This is a real danger if you take advantage of the last point above and write chapters out of order. If you write your ending first, well, it's all done then, innit?
So.... Should you do an outline? Yes. No. Maybe. Up to you.
Glad I could help you out there.
Hugs,
Erin
Comments
outlines
Erin is 100% right :)
Although I would say any longer work that a writer begins should have some type of outline. Why? The reason Erin stated above is a big reason, if work, health, family or all the above force you to put aside the writing, the outline will help you remember the story so you can continue writing it.
A great example of this is my Super Soldier story, due to heath and work issues I had to put it on hiatus. Not only has the story been plotted and outlined so eventually I can return to writing it, there is a 2nd book in the series plotted out. So while it is unfinished at this time, I can return to it and with some review, begin right where I left off.
Another reason is that it is too easy for the story to become side tracked into a completely different direction than you originally intended. Not to say if you find the new direction is better, you should ignore it, but if it is you should plot it out to a conclusion, make sure the new direction hasn't brought up plot holes or worse left your story open ended or will eventually put you into a corner you can not write yourself out of.
My two stories "Coyote" and "Necessity is the Mother of Invention" are both examples of this. Both stories spawned from the same plot, although the ideas that lead to the writing of Coyote came about while writing Necessity. I liked the idea behind Coyote too much to disregard it, even though I knew that it would become a dead end once she reached the school for mutants. Instead of abandoning either, I created a new outline for Coyote and wrote it, then returned to writing the original, which I am currently posting.
Also without some direction many writers lose track of their train of thought and abandon a story due to lack of ideas. if you flesh out these ideas and write them down this is less likely.
The courses I took on writing way back in the distant past taught us that there were 2 types of writers. Those that outline and get everything in order before beginning the first sentence of prose. And the discovery writer, this is probably what the majority of writers here are. We get an idea and start writing the story without any direction and let the muse take us where it may.
Personally I hate writing outlines, especially heavily detailed ones that leave me feeling like I've already written the whole story. But without some kind of outline I can't write anything that runs more than 20 or 30k in word length. So I discovered another type of outlining, one that's been called point to point discovery writing. in this type of outlining you only write down your main plot points. Then let your muse have fun writing away, but with the plot points providing the 'blinders' to keep something shiny on the side from distracting you or the muse and leading you off course.
A point to point discovery outline can be as simple as the following;
Timmy goes to beach
Timmy find magical lamp
Magical lamp turns Timmy into Tammy
No one remembers Timmy's old life and instead they remember Tammy.
End of story
Or No one knows Tammy and now you must plot out new point to write to.
new point-Tammy must convince mom and dad of who she is.
new point-Does she succeed or fail? If fail what does she do? if succeed what happens next?
and so forth with your new plot points until the conclusion of her in her new life.
We the willing, led by the unsure. Have been doing so much with so little for so long,
We are now qualified to do anything with nothing.
When I write I use a stripped down bullet point general outline
that I call an index. Then as I write the story I list each character with brief description & relationships in the index for easy future reference. I do the same for locations. As new ideas or plot twists occur, I insert as appropriate into the bullet point outline. If it's an ongoing story I even do spreadsheets to keep a timeline. This system is flexible and lets me step away and resume almost at will while keeping the goal clear.
Boys will be girls... if they're lucky!
Jennifer Sue
Now I do...
Since I’ve found it next to impossible to write a short story, and with my failed Guardians, yes I do a simple outline... My problem with Guardians is I had a side storyline that I advanced too much and too quickly... I need to do a rewrite, but I frustrated myself too much to go back to it yet...
Before I even do the outline I create a list of people (Names and a brief description) and also one of main locations in the story... I’ll add to that if the story ends up ‘finding’ more people... It helps me to keep everyone straight in my head, and also the outline helps me to pace the story better.
While there is an outline, but it’s not a highly detailed one. I have the main points, and then try to steer the story to each point...
Becca C.
I know I’m weird. The fact that I’m trans is probably one of the more normal things about me.
Outline Before Story?
I guess if one had any idea what the heck the story was about and where it was headed. Every time "I" try and write anything it looks like someone with crayons trying to write. Yes that bad. I gave up a long time ago thinking I was a writer. I'll say this again for those who haven't read some of my responses to questions about my stories. I NEVER have any idea what the story is about or where it is going until it is finished. Many times readers want a continuation of a story. I can't unless like the original, it is given to me to write. Am I a writer? Nope not in this life I'm not. Outline? Yer yanking my chain ain't yuh?
always
Barb
Life is a gift. Treasure it until it's time to return it.
Oklahoma born and raised cowgirl
Loose Outline
I usually do a bullet sheet. On one story I'm fiddling with, I've got a chronological chart about 4 feet top to bottom, just to see if that helped.
My biggest impediment to writing is that Win 10 makes it almost impossible to organize files, save them where you want them to go, and find them when you haven't accessed them in a while. In Word, the default save locations seem to be unreliable and something changes them without warning and very sneakily.
The older versions of Windows were much better. I've looked for a file management program I like... I've even thought of going back to Wordperfect. Now that I'm thinking about it, I might do that.
Is Wordperfect compatible with Drupal?
Wordperfect
As far as cut and paste from text, WP works as well as anything does with Drupal. :)
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
Windows 10
I use Windows 10, but I've been using Windows occasionally since Windows 2.0 (yes, that long ago), and regularly since Windows 95. I also use Microsoft Office, currently Office 2010, though I much prefer the interface on versions prior to Office 2003. I have no problem organizing my files or saving them where I want them to go. Perhaps the difference is that I tell Windows and Office where to put the files, instead of letting them tell me.
planning
Sometimes I have a plan, sometimes not, but i've never done a formal outline since finishing at Uni!
I do have character lists and sometimes I have a calendar of events but I find it a double edged sword. It can help prevent missing elements of plot I want to include, at the same time it can straight jacket the story - not such an issue for a shorter story but I like my bigger opii to be more organic.
If I was looking for a publisher i'd do something formal but i'm not so I don't.
Mads
Madeline Anafrid Bell
Outline? - Never
I tried once and I discovered it a waste of time, as my muse took me in a completely opposite direction.
I start with an idea, or several linked ideas and then set off with a protagonist and otherwise with absolutely no idea where this is going. I do not even know what is on the next page, let alone how it is going to end.
As for remembering what I've done... yes, that is a problem, but it is also a way of sorting writers-bock. Continuity is difficult, even with an outline, for it is always the little things... like dog's names and stuff that you forget or I tend to remember dog's names for other books.
I have around twenty books on the go at any one time, so when I hit a wall on one, I go back to another and re-read it to date and then set off once more.
It is the constant re-reading of my work that sorts out continuity and gives me inspiration as to where to head off to next. Likewise, leaving a book and returning to it later is often a great ploy.
Horses for courses.
Tanya
There's no such thing as bad weather, just the wrong clothes!
Artists, Frameworks and Inspirations
If I may, I'd like to offer a couple of personal thoughts.
The first is that we are NOT writers. We are storytellers and artists first. Instead of paint, or clay, or musical instruments, we use words to create images and emotions in our audiences' minds. Writing is merely the mechanism by which we convey those images and emotions, and our dexterity in manipulating words is akin to a painter's skill with a brush or palette knife. Something that only comes with practice and training. However, no matter how clever we are with words, unless there is that initial spark, a story that demands to get out to grab the attention of our audience, everything else will just be clever wordsmithing.
If you can accept that first point, of being a storyteller/artist whose medium is the written word, then it becomes easier to accept that there can't be a standard process or template to create stories. I once made the mistake of signing up for the Open University's Creative Writing course. I lasted two weeks because the tutor insisted that, as she was a published author, we would only succeed if we followed her methodology.
So, if there isn't a standard template, what is there? I would argue that what we all share are two things. A vision of what we want to achieve, and a plan of how to get there. The trouble is that we all plan in different ways. It could be a hazy bunch of ideas that crystallise as we write, or a beautifully crafted, multi page outline, complete with detailed character sketches and elaborate timelines and built using a specialised author's tool like Scrivener. It doesn't matter, the key thing is we have a plan.
Here's some simple suggestions about plans(outlines) that I use.
One final thought. Inspiration tells us where we want to get to, a plan tells us how we are going to get there. The tricky bit is making sure they don't get in each other's way. :)
Persephone
Non sum qualis eram
Instead of doing an outline:
What if, Viper, Sabrina and The seduction never had an outline and simply more or less wrote themselves so far.
For Foreign influence, as it took years to write, I created something similar to continuity in a movie production, After every chapter I added to a file, that listed charcters and their main chracteristics, what happened and details about the MC's clothes and such. That got me fine through through the whole story, but that one, too, never had an outline either.
So really it all depends how "coherent" your muse is, really :)
Monique S
Never learned to use them
Someone, long ago suggested I might be more productive with an outline. So I began outlining story ideas. My problem is that my muse likes the chase. I get an idea and my muse chases it to the end. If I outline it, my muse is satisfied; I've reached the end. Filling in the story is just work and my muse refused to be involved and I lose motivation.
That said, I do need to know just what direction the end is in. While I don't write the ending, I do have a good idea of just where it is and what it will look like before I get the first paragraph written. So I guess that I'm a "Discovery" writer.
Perhaps I should try the point to point discovery method.
I once wrote a 60K word story, which I sold for a mere $200 dollars. I'm sorry I sold it. I think it's one of my best works, especially since it was early in my career. Actually, it was 64K words, but Reluctant Press (the publisher I sold it to) wouldn't take stories over 60K, so I had trim it back. It was like gutting my child. Never want to do that again. But that was before Big Closet, even before I discovered Fictionmania or any other online site I could publish at. Currently I have a copy of it in PDF That's DRM, I tried to buy back the copyright from the publishers one time and negotiations were going well, but real life got in the way and I lost the contact information due to a move.
Hugs
Patricia
Happiness is being all dressed up and HAVING some place to go.
Semper in femineo gerunt
Ich bin eine Mann
Outlines
I guess I'm a bad girl because I never use an outline. I'll leave myself notes on the first page on particularly long stories but that's about it. I'll plot it all out loosely in my head, which, granted, isn't the safest place to store anything. I just kinda write by the seat of my pants.
Not an Outline Fan
I'm not saying outlines are bad. I'm just saying I don't use them.
Why? A lot of my short stories start off as single ideas. As I write those short stories, some expand in different directions that become novellas or novels. Would writing an outline limit those opportunities?
But, conversely, when I started Wildcats as a short story. I made a serious mistake by writing and publishing it chapter by chapter. As it morphed and changed dramatically, it was a sloppy effort. I wished I had planned it better and created an outline. Because I didn't use an outline or plan it effectively, I ended up rewriting the story five times.
I learned that I shouldn't publish a story until it was finished. It took almost a year to get Jessica Jade done because I rewrote it until I was satisfied. It would not have worked with an outline.
And right now, I am planning to rewrite Wildcats again one more time. It will be a complete novel that would include all the existing stories and the last two books which have not been published yet.
I am rewriting a short story called Collected. It is becoming a full-fledged sci-fi novel that has grown in many directions that were never anticipated. I'm afraid that an outline would have been futile.
But, if anyone would please advice me on a problem that I am having. Because of my miserable short term memory, I often find myself having to read my own story from the beginning every time I write. When the story reaches 40,000 words this becomes a cumbersome task.
If anyone has a suggestion or a solution, I need to hear it.
Do an outline with a difference
I've done this on long stories, an outline of what I've already written. It's good writing discipline too.
Paragraphs (other than dialog) should be constructed with a topic sentence, usually the first one. The topic sentence lays out what the paragraph is about. Paragraphs should advance to a conclusion which is often what the next paragraph is about and may serve as the topic sentence of that following block.
Go through what you have written, highlighting the topic sentences and enough lines of dialog to show the progress of the story. That's your outline. Re-read your outline to get back into the rhythm of your writing.
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.