Actually, I like outlining as it keeps me from too many false starts. Not that I do as much of it as I used to. I tend to just walk around thinking about a story for a while nowadays. But I've never found it a chore--more of a creative mind experiment. Though it does keep me from the difficult task: getting the words right on the page. Nothing annoys me more to find that the words themselves aren't bad, but useless because I didn't conceptualize the story first in my head, and staring at a short list sometimes does just that. :)
Well, it makes it more clear to me that I have to cut sub-plots....I tend to overdo that, and I always figure that out AFTER I finish the first draft. The second outline always reminds me what's inportant in the plot.
I only work Monday through Wednesday. I'll be starting on it this afternoon. I'm hoping to have the initial outline and scene-by-scene breakdown finished by Sunday.
I'm sort of the other way around. I do a modest outline at the beginning, then rethink it once I'm done.
I can write scenes all day, happily typing away, imagining little conversations. Type-type-type.
I read novels like this occasionally, where the writer is famous enough to get away with that, just throwing in random scenes that have nothing to do with the plot (Many of them use this technique to set up their next related book, I've noted). Wow, I wish I could be that writer!
The second outlining makes me sit down and re-evaluate every scene, every POV, and every character and ask whether they need to be there. It's painful, because I love my babies, and I'm ruthlessly cutting them out of my story.
For this outline, it looks like I'm going to cut two POV characters and one entire sub-plot. But in order to keep the novel tight (which topped out at 640 pages), I have to.
This just goes to show how different writers approach things differently...I think our brains just don't work in the same manner.
Yes, I figured we were different. I tend to write too short and then add. I guess what I meant to say was that I like outlining because it doesn't really matter. It's all in my head. There's no pressure. Just my imagination running wild. Once I start writing I hate to make too many mistakes. Sure, once the first draft is done I'll sit there and play with it hours on end, but if I don't get it pretty much right the first time I'll abandond the story. By "right," I think I mean the tone of the story. It's hard, at least for me, to change the tone once I've got it in my head and on paper what I think it should be.
I never, ever, did an outline... and of course I never finished anything, my brain and characters going everywhere. Finally, right before my son was born, I outlined a book and finished it fast, then did another outline and finished the second book even faster. Now I do nothing without an outline. As a matter of fact I have taken a week to do an extensive outline of my new short story [thanks to you] and it will be less than 10k words.
On the first two novels I wrote, I stuck with the outline pretty well, and the second version wasn't too painful.
This third novel, though, had a derailleur sort of like what you described. I added a POV character about 1/3 of the way through writing (she was there before, just didn't have POV) and it skewed EVERTHING out of place. But I liked that POV, so I stuck with it.
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I'm with Melissa, though, in that I don't do it. I should, but don't seem to have the knack for it.
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Adventure. Excitment. Bah! A writer craves not these things!
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I can write scenes all day, happily typing away, imagining little conversations. Type-type-type.
I read novels like this occasionally, where the writer is famous enough to get away with that, just throwing in random scenes that have nothing to do with the plot (Many of them use this technique to set up their next related book, I've noted). Wow, I wish I could be that writer!
The second outlining makes me sit down and re-evaluate every scene, every POV, and every character and ask whether they need to be there. It's painful, because I love my babies, and I'm ruthlessly cutting them out of my story.
For this outline, it looks like I'm going to cut two POV characters and one entire sub-plot. But in order to keep the novel tight (which topped out at 640 pages), I have to.
This just goes to show how different writers approach things differently...I think our brains just don't work in the same manner.
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Outline
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This third novel, though, had a derailleur sort of like what you described. I added a POV character about 1/3 of the way through writing (she was there before, just didn't have POV) and it skewed EVERTHING out of place. But I liked that POV, so I stuck with it.
Usualy, it's not this bad!
Re: Outline