This post is the first in a series where we discuss each genre in depth, so that you can have an understanding about each genre and the expectations for each. But, before we do that, let’s think about why this information is important? Genres, what are they, and why is it important to know your genre and the expectations that the audience has when you write in it?
Starting with an example. Let’s say you want to write a horror novel, but you decide to subvert those expectations, and make it from the point of view of the killer. Totally fine, seems like a great idea. But, if you don’t understand that the genre has expectations to start the atmosphere of dread early on in the story, that you are supposed to be giving your audience that delicious rush of anxiety and adrenaline as they worry if their favorite character is safe; you may fall into the mistake of creating a happy atmosphere instead of one that stokes the dread in the story. Your killer may be excited about what they are doing, but that isn’t the right tone for a horror novel.
Let’s start with a list of the different genres and a brief summary of what each one is:
Before we dive into the genres, I am going to say that my list is generalized, and I will put as much information into each specific post for each genre, but this is a brief overview of the general genres.
Children’s Fiction
Literary Fiction
Historical
Young Adult
Religious
Western
Thriller
Action-Adventure
Comedy
Crime and Mystery
Fantasy
Sci-Fi
Romance
Horror
There are a lot of sub-genres for each genre. What I will do is go into each genre specifically. I will do an overview of what the genre expectations are for each genre. The general things to know are word count expectations, and then normal plot devices. For example, in a mystery, the readers expect that a person will die within the first chapters of the book, and then that protagonist will be tasked with finding the killer, and they will somehow able to do it when others can’t. A book is not a mystery if there are not several suspects running around with means/opportunity and motive.
Essentially, when looking to publish in any genre, you need to know not only the logistics of what will be acceptable, but you need to know what your readers will enjoy and pick up. There was the brief overview of genres: what are they? Please let me know if you have questions, if you would like to see something else, all of that good stuff. Thanks!
If you are anything like me, you spend a lot of time thinking about how much you can’t. Or possibly about why you can’t. When you can’t. Even the many reasons that it makes sense to not, instead of TO DO. Mindsets are hard things to change, but it is very important to try. This post will go over some methods for battling negativity, so that you can get to writing instead of making excuses.
I don’t know how many writers feel this way, but I am great at making reasons about the impossibility of getting it done today, all the way up until I’m doing it. Then, when I begin, it’s like all of that melts away, the entire world disappears; and it’s just me and my story, or essay, or post or whatever and none of the rest of it matters. So then I find my self wondering, why did I go through all of that?
I think one of my issues, boils down to self-care. I am a wife, a mom, a full-time employee, a dinner-maker, a laundress, a part-time gamer (haha), a shoe-finder, a maid, a time-out giver, a referee, a sister, a daughter, a dog-mom, a cat-mom, and at the very end of the list, I am the thing I most want out of life, a writer. Oh, and sometimes I even exercise.
With all of the things that I do, all the things that I have going on all the time, it is so hard to find that moment where I feel like it’s okay to write. I don’t get paid for writing, so why do it? The answer, because it is the thing that gives me (besides, you know, family and kids and love) the most-I don’t want to say joy, but that is the word that first came to mind- fulfillment, maybe is another one.
If we are constantly putting ourselves last, we not only get burnt out, but we also end up feeling resentment toward those who we love the most. In most cases, your family and loved ones will understand if you choose to spend a few minutes on yourself each day. I say most cases because I understand that there are exceptions. And simply getting the time to do the thing will increase your confidence in the story, which will help you to feel more positive about it, and negativity decreases.
Habit Building
I have spoken about habit-forming before. What does it have to do with battling the negative version of ourselves that either stops us from writing, by telling us we can’t do it? How does forming habits help us to put ourselves higher on the priority list so that we can write more and feel better about it?
Habits are like muscles. Think about any person whose great at sports. They practice, probably every day. They don’t just do their sport for a couple of days, and then stop for a while, and then practice again later for a few days. The people that come to mind for me are Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, Tony Hawk, and Serena Williams. None of those people got to where they are without practicing their sport consistently over years and years. I am not talking about any kind of scandals or anything, simply that they are good at what they do, and the reason is because they consistently practice.
In the writing world, authors that have spoken about how important it is to write every day are: Stephen King and Brandon Sanderson. Those are the ones I think about off the top of my head. Brian Evenson said that you need to take the “speacialness” out of writing. Do it anywhere at any time. He uses hotel paper to write on, and he will switch to a computer if he finds himself stuck. Make writing such an everyday thing that it doesn’t matter how you are doing it, as long as it’s getting done.
The point about habit-forming is essentially that you need to get your writing muscles used to doing it. If you want to be a writer, you have to write. In order to conquer your negative self, you have to find a way to write even when you feel some kind of way about it that day.
Replace Negatives with Positives
This one is more of a psychological trick. Let’s say that you keep on thinking that you shouldn’t write because you have nothing to say. You need to turn that thought around and replace it with a different thought. You can acknowledge the thought, but then replace it. Tell yourself that you have lots to say. In a previous post: Coming up with Story Ideas I talked about how living in the world means you have something to say.
Or maybe you think that you write badly, so you shouldn’t be doing it. Again, it’s okay to acknowledge the thought, but then you can either ask yourself why you think you write badly. Why do you think that? Is it really true, has someone told you that? Or, are you concerned that you don’t have great grammar? Or do you think your descriptions are not great? Whatever it is, you can work on it. Writing is a craft. It’s not something that you can or can’t do. You just have to study, hone your craft, take the time to read and learn and take in new information.
What if you are just feeling negative/down/upset because you submitted to like 14 different literary journals and the ones you’ve heard back from rejected you. You think the story is good, and it has merit. Or, at least, you did until you got all the rejections. It’s okay to reach out and ask for POSITIVE feedback from a friend. I typically would say not to let anyone who loves you give your feedback. But, in times like these, when you are feeling like you just can’t take another rejection, when you are doubting your whole life. Have a supportive friend tell you how awesome you are. It’s best if you find that one friend who is always sunshine and rainbows, and they can tell you how much they think you rock. Moms are totally acceptable in these scenarios.
Maybe you can’t turn off the voice telling you that you aren’t good enough. Maybe you can’t stop yourself from having a lot of other priorities above your writing. But you can form healthy habits that allow you to have some time each day to write, you can turn those negative thoughts around, look at them and respond to them with positive counter-thoughts. You can take some time for self-care, even if it is taking a half an hour to hammer out a quick post on your blog.
Recently, I realized while writing my current WIP, one of my main characters had an issue with their arc. After discussing it with a friend, I thought it may be a good subject to write about. Not only the issue at hand, but also how do we make character arcs that are compelling? Read on for more information about character arc, how to write it, why it’s important, and what kind of impact it has on the plot.
The character arc is the inner journey that the main character or characters go through over the course of the story. Usually, there is some important trait that the character(s) need to develop in order for the plot to resolve itself. For example: in A Christmas Carol the main character goes from being an old miser, who wants only to keep all of his money, to being a generous person. His inner journey is that arc. It walks hand-in-glove with the plot, all the elements that are happening on the outside.
How do you make one?
How do you make your character arc? Essentially, the first thing is to envision what you want the character to be at the end of the story. Do you want them to learn a lesson about being a better fighter? Do you want them to learn that it’s not good to be a bully? Whatever the story is that you are telling, you need to think about what you want the character to learn, and then you work from there. If you want your character to be harder than they were at the beginning, then make sure that they are soft when the story begins. If you want them to learn about kindness, then they need to be unkind.
How does this work into Plot?
It is, and it isn’t the plot, if that makes sense. The plot is the thing that the story lives on. The skeleton, or the roadmap, or whatever you want to call it. The character arc is the meat that goes on the bones, kind of, or the way that the story becomes believable, or maybe the way that the reader is able to suspend their disbelief long enough for the story to take place. The character arc is written into many plot points. There are moments where the character is able to learn a new skill. Or do something they failed at before. Those moments not only require that the character is at the right location at the right time, but that they have gone through enough mental growth that the moments are possible.
Character Arc Image
I don’t think I have one, do I need one?
Probably. Most stories involve some kind of personal growth. Even if that growth is learning a new skill (like going from being a down-on-their-luck paper pusher to being a CIA agent, or something). It is still mental and physical change, of some kind. Learning a skill will take not only practice, but also confidence building, and probably encouragement from someone the character admires. However, I will put a caveat here: there are some stories that don’t have a character arc, really long series’ like Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum novels. In these, the character doesn’t change much over the course of a single novel; simply because the reader expects that they will be getting into the same kind of antics during the course of the next one. Because of that expectation, we cannot have the character change and get their life together every single novel, just to have it fall apart again.
Character Arc Conclusion
At the end of the day, when you make a character arc, the trick is to think about where you want your main character(s) to end up. Then, think about what kind of story you are telling. Where can those two things meet? If you want to write a horror story, and you want to end up with a character who has learned that it doesn’t pay to be a bully; maybe you start out with your characters as camp counselors, and your main character is making the younger kids feel bad. Maybe there is one in particular they are picking on. Then, the horror starts, and the main character has to take care of the kids and make sure they are okay, and the main character’s arc is getting the kid that he made fun of to trust him, so that he will survive the ordeal.
Even though I am what you would call a pantser or a discovery writer. These things, if you want them to come out right, they do take planning. You either plan before, or you change everything during a rewriter when you figure out it didn’t work.
When I first decided to do a blog, I got into the habit of writing a post a day. That’s good, but then what about the writing of my current WIP? I got to the point where I was writing for my blog(s) and not doing the more creative writing that I went to school for, the writing that I find to be very important. The question became, how do you use your new writing habit, take up time management, and still have a life? I will discuss what I have done.
Photo by Steve Johnson
Writing Habit
In a previous post about habit-formation, found here: The Habit of Writing, I discuss how it’s important not to try to change everything all at once, and also how good it is to start small. I want to add to that idea and say that it’s also a good idea to prioritize.
Prioritize
I have recently learned that by trying to make sure that I’m posting every day, the more urgent–or creative–or whatever you want to call it–writing got pushed to the back burner, which is not where I want it to be. Because I knew that I wanted to be doing more writing for my novel, I had to re-think which kind of writing I was doing first.
Now, my writing life looks like 1-write AT LEAST X words for my WIP. I have an alert set to let me know when I have written enough. Then, and only then will I move on to post on one of my blogs. The next thing I have changed is to only post on one of the blogs a day. I have two of them. The first one is the actual website (this one) and the other one is a wordpress site, which I have continued to make content for even though I have a website that doesn’t have the .wordpress.com in the name. But, you know, whatever.
Photo by Andrey Grushnikov
Time Management
The time management piece of this whole thing is that I have begun to use a calendar to show me what kind of time I have. What little pieces of time I can use throughout the day. I was hoping, when I started looking at blocking time out on a calendar, that I was less busy than I though, that isn’t exactly true, not if I want to do a good job, be the kind of employee that continues to be gainfully employed, but, at least I know now. I still end up doing writing at night mostly.
There are many ways to use the calendar method for blocking out time. You can plan to do focused work in the morning before you get busy, and I could, in theory wake up and do some writing before anyone in my house gets up. And, actually I used this method when I had only one child. My second one is a bit of an early bird and has a tendency to want to ‘help’ with everything, so that probably won’t work. But, it is a thought.
Conclusion
The ideas here are: 1-begin to block your time-out on a calendar, if you start to feel like you don’t have any time to write. Find those little pockets of time that you do have, and identify the blocks that will actually work for you to write. 2-Prioritize your writing life. If you find yourself working on several projects. Some of which are taking up a lot of time, but are not as high priority to you. Then, put the one that is the highest priority above the others. Only work on your other, lower-priority projects once you’ve reached a certain goal on the highest priority project. 3- Finally, keep your writing goals within reach. As with habit formation, make sure that you are taking baby steps before you are trying to sprint. Walk before you run, if you will.
Thank you for reading…this was my post about writing habit, time management and life. Feel free to share your tips for solving these writerly problems.
Tension and conflict are the heart of a story. Both are important tools to use, it is necessary to a successful story that the tension raises throughout the tale. The tension needs to pull the reader/audience along, it keeps them turning pages. While the conflict of the story, does the same thing, but in a different way. We will talk about these two important pieces of story. Tension and conflict in writing.
Tension and Conflict in Writing
Photo by Velroy Fernandes
Tension
Tension is the feeling that something bad is going to happen. That feeling of something around the corner. This is used in a lot of different ways, we up the tension between characters, sometimes it’s two people who don’t get along that well; sometimes it’s sexual tension. Other times, the tension is a feeling of things about to fall apart. The plan, so carefully constructed, isn’t going to work at all. Maybe, if your story is of the thriller or horror variety, the tension is the killer/monster getting closer, while the protagonist remains in the dark.
The tension in the story should draw tighter and tighter, before releasing, and then it should do it again. You should have several moments in the story where tension is released, and then it builds back up, before crescendoing during the climax, and finally breaking once and for all during the resolution
Conflict
Photo by Yan Krukov
Conflict, while easier to understand, can also be easy to misunderstand. Conflict is not always an argument or a fight. It can simply be a moment where the character has two things that clash with each other. Maybe they have two goals; but if they reach one, the other is hindered. That itself would create conflict in the story.
Conflict can also be direct, the protagonist and the antagonist, a fight or even a war, depending on the story. But, think about everyday life. There are lots of things that are in conflict with each other all the time. You have little arguments with your spouse/child/brother/sister/mother/father/the weird lady at the service counter. You have issues in traffic, or you have conflicting opinions in your own mind. All of these things feed into the story. Every step of the way, you should have tension that raises, and conflicts that need to be resolved.
Every story needs to have both tension and conflict in writing. Hopefully this article gave a little clarification on what that means, and how to apply to your own writing. Thank you for reading, let me know if you would like more of the same types of posts, or different ones.
Save the Cat is a plot type where the different parts of the plot are broken into “beats.” All the beats have a particular percentage associated with them. Which allows an aspiring writer to understand how much of the story belong to each part. Without further ado, here is Save the Cat story structure.
Photo by Anni Roenkae
Save the Cat Story Structure Beats
Act 1
Opening Image (0-1%): A snapshot of the protagonist and their world.
Theme Stated (5%): A statement, made by someone else, not the protagonist. It hints at what the character arc for the protagonist is going to be. This is also referred to as a life lesson.
Set up (1-10%): This is what I call the “day in the life of.” This is where you see the protagonist’s world before things change for them.
Catalyst (10%): This is the inciting incident, the thing that happens that changes everything for the protagonist, and makes their old life impossible to go back to.
Debate (10-20%): A section where the protagonist debates about what to do next. This should show their resistance to change.
Act 2
Break into 2 (20%): This is the moment where the protagonist accepts the call to action, essentially they decide to take action in a way that moves the story forward.
B Story (22%): A new character is introduced that will help the protagonist along the way. This person will help the protagonist grow, and assist in resolving their character arc.
Fun and Games (20-50%): This is where we see the character in the new world, they are either succeeding or floundering. This section represents the “hook” of the story.
Midpoint (50%): The fun and games section culminates in either a false victory, or false defeat, and should raise the stakes and push the story forward for the protagonist.
Bad Guys Close In (50-75%): If the mid-point ended with a false victory, then everything should start to get worse. If it ended in a false defeat, then things should start to look up for the protagonist. Either way, the protagonist’s deep-rooted flaws are closing in.
All is lost (75%): The lowest point. Something pushes our protagonist to rock-bottom.
Dark Night of the Soul (75-80%): A moment where the protagonist reacts to everything that has happened so far. They should be worse off than they were at the beginning of the story. This is the moment right before they figure everything out.
Photo by Marco Comolatti
Act 3
Break Into 3 (80%): The moment when the protagonist realizes what needs to be done to fix the problems from Act 2, and also to fix themselves. Their character arc is almost completed.
Finale (80-99%): The protagonist enacts the plan that they came up with. The world is not only saved, it’s better than it was before.
Final image (99-100%): This is a mirror to the opening image, where everything is fixed.
If you have read some of my other posts, or you have some knowledge of plot structure, you will notice the similarity to Freytag’s pyramid, and to the three-act-story-structure. In reality, most plot types will follow the same trajectory. This is one is good if you need to know about specific things and when they should happen in your story to keep yourself on track.
The next time I discuss plot, we will look at a structure that is near and dear to my heart, the hero’s journey. So stay tuned for that, and thank you for reading and let me know if you have any questions.
My philosophy when it comes to writing emotions is that it’s important to understand what feeling them is like. Unfortunately, for me as a writer, this means that when I’m feeling some-kind-of-way, I get all mindful about it. When I feel extreme emotions, I use it for study, I have a tendency to journal about it, so I can come back to it later when I need it. Here is my advice on how to tackle emotional writing.
“They” tell you to write what you know. This advice, I think, really comes into play when we are talking about emotions. You can study the mechanics of spaceships, or make it up as you go along. But, what you can’t really study, what you can’t really just look up, is how it feels when you get dumped, or how it feels to be really sad over the loss of a pet or a loved one. You can’t study those things, and expect it to come out feeling authentic, you need to experience them.
I’m not saying that you need to experience the exact thing you are writing about in order to hit the emotions right. What I am saying is that everyone probably has times in their life where things have happened that made them feel a close enough facsimile to what the character is going through that they can use it. The trick is to remember, and do it safely, if it’s a traumatic event. For example: I’ve never been an assassin, but there have been moments in my life where I have witnessed things that allow me to feel like I can come close to that emotional state.
Use Observation
As a writer, you should be watching the world around you. Hopefully participating, but also observing pretty keenly what is going on around you. This is helpful when there is someone close to you who is going through something. You don’t want to go all Harriet the Spy on them and use them, but you know, it’s okay to file away their emotional state for later writing. An example of this: Your friend is having a freak-out because she found out her boyfriend is cheating, she is crying at points, but also angry, she’s pulling her hair out literally, she’s also asking if it’s her fault, somehow. You are helping her and making sure that she’s okay, of course, but also just noting down in your mind how the different emotions are at play while she’s going through this devastating time. Emotions are tricky and layered, nuanced and sometimes baffling.
Being able to show all of those things to a reader, or an audience is a difficult task, and one of the most powerful tools used to tackle this task is both self-observation, and observing the world around you.
Of course, you can always go back to your favorite works that have really wonderful emotional writing in them, and see how that author tackled it. This is where being well-read is helpful. If you are stuck on a scene where the character is going through something you have no way of ever fathoming, you can go back and read about it through a different author’s eyes, what did they do that made the scene compelling, how did they make you feel what you want your audience to feel?
Show the emotion, like I mentioned before, not tell it. Don’t say that the character felt happy, but say for example: her face broke out into a grin, her body felt light, she felt as though she could run a marathon without stopping, or jump to the moon. Or something like that, make the readers understand the emotion without being told WHAT to feel.
Projecting
This is one that I have a tendency to use while I’m in the process of writing. I just, kind of, project myself into the situation and think about how I would feel if I was there. I feel like it’s the simplest, just think about being that person in their shoes, how would you feel there–in that moment–and then write out those emotions. However, this idea does have its drawbacks because your emotions may not match those you are trying to convey for the character you’ve created. For example: my stone-cold assassin isn’t going to start crying or screaming when she sees a dead body. She would be cold and calculating and would think about her next move.
Conclusion
There are many ways to get to the heart of the emotion that you want to convey for your character. It is best to remember that emotions are faceted and nuanced things, and that they may start out one way, and then turn into something else, and then finish completely different. Showing emotions is very important, it is boring to read emotion words, it’s much more dynamic to read what kinds of actions those emotions are creating within the character.
Thanks for reading! Let me know if this is something that is helpful and interesting, or if you would rather read about other things.
One of the first pieces of advice I came across when I decided to look at writing craft was the ever popular: show, don’t tell. It took me time to piece this advice together. Now I understand exactly what it means and why it keeps being repeated. Here is my take on showing versus telling in writing.
Photo by Tuesday Temptation
Showing Versus Telling in Writing
When to show, and what does it mean.
Showing is kind of a strange way to put it, when it comes to writing, since everything is written. It’s not as though the writer can somehow make a movie pop out of the book and allow the reader to view something. Showing is simply the act of allowing the reader to visualize what is happening, as opposed to summing it up or “telling” the reader (for lack of a better term) what you want them to know or feel.
Showing versus telling in writing Example(s)
An example of this: The grass was green and warm, the sun shone brightly that day. We sat on the damp ground, unaware that our pants were wet. We picked daisies, the heavy perfume of spring intoxicated our minds, and we drank it in, laughing, finally, our fingers touched, and it was as though sunlight shone from our very souls.
Showing allows the reader to get right into the action, or the emotional center of the story that you are trying to tell. This is a great method during those moments where you have an action scene, or you have a heavy emotional moment, and you want to make sure that your readers are right there with your characters their entire time.
What is Telling, and what does it mean
As you can imagine, telling is the opposite of showing. When you are in telling mode, you are summarizing events, or possibly talking about a person and just letting your readers know what they are like instead of showing actions that they are doing or have done. This is useful for moments when you need to sum up events that happened, or when you have a character that you need to quickly introduce. Also, telling is something that can help you get through parts that aren’t as eventful, but that have a moment you would like to get to.
Photo by Mikhail Nilov
Showing versus Telling in Writing Example(s)
For example: The old woman was kind. It was apparent in her gray eyes.
Another example: I stopped listening to her yammer on, I’d heard the story so many times, yeah, she’d been through so much, we all knew about it.
In the first example, we are telling our readers that a person is kind, but we don’t have anything to “show.” In the second example, the POV character isn’t listening to the other character, and isn’t what you would call “in-the-moment.” In the second example, you could imagine that there would have been showing before, and showing to come after. But that little piece is telling.
Conclusion
Both showing and telling are important pieces of writing to use. Especially when it comes to storytelling. They say to show as much as you can, but there will be moments where it makes more sense to tell.
It doesn’t make sense to show dialogue for the openings and closings of conversations, you can just tell those parts. It doesn’t make sense to show the parts of the story that aren’t interesting, or don’t develop the character. I am saying that it’s important to be intentional on which scenes you choose to show and which are more tell. Understand the balance. Make it work so that the story flows well.
I once had a class where an author came and spoke about the differences between writers, and everyone else. What are these differences? Writers take their weird thoughts and expand on them. Non-writers will just shrug them off, and move on. With that being said, let’s talk about coming up with story ideas.
How does a person come up with an idea for a story? Lots of ways. I will go over a few that I’ve used below.
Writing Prompts
One of the easiest ways to come up with an idea is to look at a prompt. A writing prompt is a couple of sentences. They will usually detail a situation, and maybe a character. Then they will ask the writer to take the situation/character from there. You can sign up to get writing prompts sent to your email, or they can be found through social media.
Pictures
Grab a picture that you really love. It could be anything, it could be a photograph, it could be a painting, a drawing, maybe even a sculpture. Make a story that revolves around the picture. Imagine what the world of the picture is like, if it’s a surreal, imagine a whole where that kind of landscape can exist. If it’s a photograph, if there is a person in it, what are they like (if it’s a photo of someone you know, then focus on another aspect of the picture).
If it’s a beautiful landscape, what can you imagine happening there? What if that beautiful landscape was previously the site of a large battle, what if that landscape was the home of a fantastic creature, or a horrible murder, or what if the children gathered there on the night their parents died, or their house burned, or maybe the mountain is the one that the woman summited after she’d gone through so much, and she was finally gaining her own power back.
Photo by cottonbro
Folk/fairy Tales
Re-told fairy tales have been something that people are interested in reading for a long time now. Because they are well-known, they may be harder to get published. However, that shouldn’t stop anyone from taking their favorite folk and fairy tales and then bringing them into the 21st Century and making them their own. You can even ditch the magical aspects, or maybe remain more faithful to the Grim’s version, or alternatively, you can take multiple tales and weave them together. Maybe Beauty is a badass carpenter, and instead of being pressured to marry the town jerk, she gets called to a mansion to make some kind of chair or railing or something, and on the way there she meets up with red riding hood or Hansel and Gretel.
Also, because the fairy tales have been done so many times and are well-known, it may be worth it to look into legends from different areas, or ones that aren’t that well-known in your area. Or you can use it as a framework for the story, without making it apparent that it came from a folk or fairy tale.
Pay Attention
This last idea is simply about paying attention to the world around you when you are out and about. When you are walking down the street, and you see someone that you find to be completely interesting, put them in a work, or use them as a jumping off point for a story. Or when you have weird occurrences happen to you, and you think “what if,” either write those down, or just try to remember them when it’s time to write.
So when coming up with story ideas, one size doesn’t fit all. But, there are enough ways to come up with a story that everyone should be able to find something to work for them.
Thank you for reading! Please let me know if you want to hear more about how to come up with ideas, or maybe a writing prompt? Let me know what you are looking for.
When looking up outlining a novel, searching it; there are so many options. There are options that have chapter-by-chapter templates, options that go into detail about structures. Because there are so many options out there, I will simply talk about my experience and share my personal thoughts on how to outline, and why.
Photo by Dids
Beginning: how to outline and why?
I would describe my writing style as more of a “pantser” instead of a “plotter.” By pantser I mean, I’m one of those “by the seat of my pants” kind of writers, who writes and discovers my plot as I go. I’m not, what you would call, a gal with a plan.
When I start writing, it’s with a kind of vague idea. Like, what if there was a society who eschewed the idea of magical people, unless they were taught properly. If their magic just appeared, they were shunned and left to die. Which is the idea I started my first what you would call “trunk novel” with. You know, that one that you finish, and then you realize that it’s a mess, and you may not ever be able to fix it, and so it sits. And it does still, finished, have re-written, just sitting. I hope someday to have the skills to fix it.
So, after the vague idea, I usually come up with a couple characters, and a conflict, or maybe conflict and then characters. Usually I have two characters that are important, and then an antagonist. Then, I get going.
What I learned from my first experience, is that some kind of outline, even if I deviate from it immediately, is paramount to writing success. We all learned how to write outlines in school at some point, some teacher in middle school taught everyone how to outline notes properly.
Outline
You can start there, if that’s where you are comfortable. Remember how the story needs to have: inciting incident, rising action, climax, falling action and resolution. You will use each of these parts of the plot to build your outline.
Example
Inciting Incident: girl finds out she has powers
Rising Action: Tries and fails to use powers, fails to do x, y, z things. Grows in power, gets advice, makes friends, has maybe a romantic moment??? The antagonist is disguised as a friend, gives bad advice or plants an idea that the readers can see will hurt the girl, but the girl’s information at the time leads her to do the thing that hurts her. Antagonist is revealed to girl and group. Antagonist is lost, they run away.
Climax: The girl and the antagonist get into a final showdown. The girl wins, and the antagonist is defeated, or maybe realizes they were wrong.
Falling Action: Romantic moment again, girl gets boy.
Resolution: All subplots are tied up, any friend relationships that need to be resolved are sewn up, maybe something is hinted that that will need to be resolved in a second book.
Photo by cottonbro
That could be an outline before you begin writing. I suggest a simple outline before beginning because it will give you something to write toward. You can just mentally remind yourself that during the first chapter or two you need to show your character and where they live, but that you need to be building toward the moment where something that happens that changes the life of your main character.
Conclusion
I don’t suggest going into a lot of detail before beginning, simply because in my experience, things change as you write. If you box yourself into a detailed chapter-by-chapter blow-by-blow of the action, then when you get a brilliant idea, it’s harder to follow it.
So, to sum up, in my experience an outline is a good idea. But, not a detailed one. However, it depends on the kind of writer you are. Thank you for reading about how to outline, and why?
