Timewaster's Guide Archive
Local Authors => Writing Group => Topic started by: EUOL on May 13, 2004, 07:43:24 PM
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How much do you do? What files do you create?
I've done it various ways. Usually I have an 'outline' document for plots, a 'character' document for characters, and a 'world' document for magic systems and things.
Sometimes, the preparatory documents are only a couple dozen pages. (Elantris.) Sometimes they're hundreds of pages long. (Dragonsteel, Way of Kings.)
Do you do any daily preparation--like, before you start writing that day? Look over your notes, write some new ones, that kind of thing.
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Well, me and SE have gotten some nice notes on a story for me to write. So hopefully that'll turn something up. I don't really like to have things down, and even though I know I should I don't. I usually like to keep it all in my head. That will however most likely change soon.
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That's all really good to hear EUOL, as I've been wondering how everybody else approaches it.
I've been outlining each chapter before I start writing (well, I don't think I have actually written anything on the latest project). One of the most helpful elements for me so far has been my "questions" section at the bottom of the chapter outlines. It usually lists things that need to be defined in some way so that I don't forget and have to go back and rewrite later for consistency.
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Well, me and SE have gotten some nice notes on a story for me to write. So hopefully that'll turn something up. I don't really like to have things down, and even though I know I should I don't. I usually like to keep it all in my head. That will however most likely change soon.
Excactly how I feel. If I do a prewrite I never get the product I origionally wanted anyway... so I just keep the main ideas in my head, sit down and write it, proofread and make any changes. It takes less time than prewriting, anyway :P...
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The thing about prewriting is that the more you do it, the better you get at planning things so they turn out the way you want. Without it, a lot of people have a tendency to wander a lot in their writing.
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I spend weeks, months, years just noting ideas. The rate at which I've gotten new ideas has accelerated recently. I write down the ideas. sometimes I outline on paper. All of it is simply to keep my ideas straight. I don't want to forget them, and there have been many ideas that I've lost in the past.
then I eventually feel like an idea has to be written out and turned into a story/novel. At that point, I need to think up several scenes so that I can actually go. I outline it in my head by deciding how I'm going to get to that scene. That generally tells me where I have to go out of it (or at least lets me know what my options are).
I sometimes find myself needing to talk about it with other people so I can figure out what my options are. Lots of conversation, usually in writing, are needed. as I go through.
As for daily prep, nto much is needed. Usually a game or two of something, an hour usually being too much, is enough. I then just open the document to where I was and pick it back up.
What is your daily prep like EUOL?
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Two things. First, I've found that if I just spend five minutes or so making a list of things I want to accomplish in a particular chapter, I write better. I just keep this list at the bottom of the document, and I scroll down and add things to it as ideas come to me during a chapter for things to happen later within it.
Second, I find that the visualization of a scene is better if I pause for a few moments before writing it and think about the mood, scenery, and distinctive elements of this particular setting in this part of the book.
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i will try those. They sound like worthy habits.
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I never write anything down until it's final, but I do however storyboard it, this helps me to describe the imagery in situatins and settings that would be otherwise vague, It also helps me to nail down my characters...
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eat a lot of candy hen go to sleep, it makes me have really funky dreams, that make for great short stories
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I kinda do a bunch in my head, but that's it. never anything formal really, since if I write it down I'll never read it again.
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In the past I have kept an idea file, but lately I've been much less organized about it and haven't gone back to them. But I do keep a writing journal in which I'll write the beginnings of scenes, etc. That way when I'm on the computer I have something like a writing prompt that gets me going on the scene.
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That's what I like about KeyNote, Stacer. It's EXCELLENT at visually organizing your ideas and still keeping them in one place
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Personally, I plan through outlines, although none of them are terribly concrete. Usually, I'll write out an outline at the beginning, with a general idea for each chapter. After writing for a while (maybe five or six chapters) I'll re-outline the whole book, and then continue on writing. I find that the very best ideas come during writing, rather than during planning, so I like to be flexible enough to go where the ideas take me. I'll usually end up with eight or ten outlines before I get to the end of a book.
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I've found that if I just spend five minutes or so making a list of things I want to accomplish in a particular chapter, I write better.
That sounds like a very intelligent and practical idea. I'm going to try that.
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I agree with HoM. You have to let yourself be flexible. However, I think that a writer does need some kind of outline to keep him/her going in the right direction. It's always okay to revise the outline, but I think you should keep an organizational 'list' of things that need to happen in the book, and the progression of their occurrence, so that you keep the book moving.
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I think we younglings can learn a thing or two from the haphazards of our eldar folks.
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Yeah, I agree EUOL--flexibility is important, but your story has to be anchored somewhere.
So far, all of my books (five -- I don't claim to be as prolific as EUOL) have used the Mr Rogers Windstorm in BubbleLand system. For those of you who don't know your Mr Rogers, the Land of Make-Believe performed an opera and, as an edict from King Friday, it had to include: bubbles, sweaters, a porpoise, and a hummingbird.
My books come together much the same way: I have a lot of independent ideas in my head (a character, or a scene, or a conversation), and try to build the story around them. I know how those key events fit together, and how the book should end, and then I outline around that. Those events are the 'anchor events' and don't change, but everything inbetween is flexible.
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outlines are important. Writing them is important so you don't forget all the ideas. Outlines do not have to be a rigid and completely descriptive. My "outlines" are usually just a list of things. As I get about halfway through, the list becomes more chronological.
For short stories, the list is, like EUOL's set of things to accomplish that day, just tacked on to the end of the story, and I delete items as I write them. I've also done this twice with novel chapters, and by EUOL's advice from above, I want to try incorporating it regularly.
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Speaking of outlines, what HoM and I have been discussing seems like pretty much the way Terry Brooks does it. He had a whole chapter on the importance of having the right kind of outline (not a school-type outline, more of a list and chronology of important ideas).
For me, outlines serve to connect what I see as the 'pivotal' scenes for a book. When I plan a novel, I look at it as a big road map. I figure out where I start, then figure out where I stop. (Those are the two most important scenes.) Then, I write down the most important character-oriented and plot-oriented scenes in the book. (Usually, by this point, I've been thinking about the book for a period of months, and I have an idea in my mind of the most dramatic events in the book.)
Writing the novel is the process of connecting these magnificent scenes I have imagined. My outline lets me keep them appropriately spaced in the novel, and allows me to add other important scenes as they come to me.