One more question....is it wise to outline your novel or just jump right in?

[jasperd]

I want to start TONIGHT but I don't want to start something and have it turn out to be flat because I didn't plan enough. On the other hand, I don't want to over-analyze and stifle the spontaneity.

[Bubastes]

Only one way to find out -- jump in! :D

Seriously, though, everyone works differently. I like having a loose outline. Other people write by the seat of their pants. Still others write very detailed outlines. Try several approaches to see what you're more comfortable with. And don't forget to have fun!

[arodriguez]

i wrote a synopsis/outline and filled a 5 subject notebook. i also drew maps, made character sketches and profiles, jotted notes in the margin,etc. It helped to ripen the story for me, so i thought about it constantly. When i began writing, it exploded from me, and not once did i have to stop because i was stuck. i did improvise on a lot of things, but overall i feel its beneficial to know what you want before you go in.

[Madison]

I agree with arodriguez. One time I leapt in and after 25000 words found I was way over my head, had to go back and reoutline (almost filled a notebook) and rewrite. Lots of pain!
Outline! You'll be done with rough draft in one month instead of five.

(Though I completely understand your eagerness to start! I'm always so impatient! But it's worth it to wait...)

[ishtar'sgate]

What works best for one person, won't necessarily work well for someone else. I mull over a storyline for quite awhile before I begin and have a general idea of how I'm going to tell my story but I can't outline or I lose interest and don't feel like writing it. Others do very detailed outlines before they start to write. You might try a small outline just to get you into your story and then see where your characters take you. Often they develop a mind of their own and take you to places you never planned to go, which to me, is half the fun.
Linnea

[Storyteller5]

It really depends on what works for you. You might have to try it both way until you know what you like.

I can't imagine writing from a complete outline. I have two or three possibilities ahead in mind as I write. I start with a premise (a what-if or a how-would-they-deal) and go. I like to listen and hear where to go next. Yes, I have rewriting, but all writers do to some degree and I don't mind rewriting. It works for me. :)

[Soccer Mom]

The only way to know is to try. We debate this continuously and there really isn't a magic answer. There are many different styles of outlining and planning and the only way to know which works for you is to try.

If you get in and get stuck, well, back up and take another run at it.

ETA: and I think you can tell which sort I am from my siggie line. :D I write enormous detailed outlines.

[kuwisdelu]

Don't listen to anyone who tells you what to do. There's no right answer to this question except to do what works for you. How do you know what works for you? Do what feels right. If that doesn't work, try the other thing. If you can't decide, maybe jot down a loose outline that you don't think will suffocate you, but so you'll at least have some idea of where you want to go. Then next time go more or less in-depth as appropriate for you.

As for myself, the first few novels I tried to write, I outlined pretty extensively. I had chapter summaries, notes, etc., but I never got down to the actual writing. The desire was gone for me. I can't do outlines. The only novel I've actually finished so far and been satisfied with is the one I jumped right into with no specific plan. I write best by the seat of my pants.

But there are others who need an outline. I can't have one. To me, it'd be the death of my story to try to outline it.

Just do what feels most right to you. If you want to jump right in, go for it. If you get stuck, then you just learned more for next time, and next time you can try a more planned approach.

[JohnDavidPaxton]

I'd join in on this thread, but I left my flame-retardant twenty-foot pole on the other forum.

I would humbly submit to you, though, that if it feels natural, do it. And if not, don't.

[Enzo]

The 'outline vs. spontaneity' debate looks like it has been with us - and on this forum - since the dinosaurs.
Search around on this site and you'll find lots of answers - and most of them saying that some people work better with outlines, and others just swim along with the tide.
You'll have to try it out yourself to see which side of the debate you fit in with.
Good luck!

[Stew21]

start writing and see what happens. If at any point you feel you would benefit from an outline, stop and outline.
We can't tell you what is going to work best for you, only you know that.

I'm a by-the-seat person, so outlining doesn't work for me. I've tried it. If I outline, what i think I want a character to do is not at all what they should be doing. I don't find out until I write it. I like it that way. It feels more natural to me.

[Linda Adams]

You have to find a way that works best for you. I've been experimenting with outlines because I've had a lot of problems with setting up the story. I just started writing with the last one and ended up doing many, many time consuming revisions to fix all the problems that caused.

But I've also always had trouble with outlines. Some of them are far too rigidly structured for me, like the index card outline, and others are too chaotic, like the snowflake outline. I even tried the Marshall Plan (a step-by-step book by Evan Marshall), but I discovered that really didn't work for me either. He does his subplots quite differently than I do, and every time I hit a subplot section, I ran into so much trouble I ended up stalling out.

So I've been experimenting with James Rollins' method. He took his favorite author, which was Michael Critchton, and used one of his books as an outline. If a character died in MC's Chapter 3, a character died in JR's Chapter 3. If a major turning point occurred, JR did a major turning point.

[KTC]

Is it wise to outline your novel or just jump right in?

Answer: YES.

Whichever works for you. For me, JUMP RIGHT IN is the only way I can do it. It's an individual preference. You have to find whichever one works for you. Or maybe you can find a balance between the two. There is no YES/NO answer. No absolutes.

[oneblindmouse]

Couldn't one be accused of plagiarism if one copied the format or outline of someone else's story? I've been tempted to copy the general outline of several novels that I really liked, but felt it was 'cheating' and too obvious. Given than there is a limit to story lines and plots, etc., writers often re-hash things written before, but how much can/should one follow others' ideas, even with completely new characters, settings, etc?

[KTC]

I don't think the example suggested to copy the story outline completely. Just the flow and timing. ???

[oneblindmouse]

Ok. I didn't mean copying the plot in its entirety; rather the general idea. Being more specific, after reading Banville's "The sea", I'd really like to write my OWN version, my own memoirs of my childhood summers set in a seaside village (NOT in Ireland). The characters would be completely different, but I would like to have a dual theme of haunting childhood memories and some other loss/tragedy/mystery. Maybe I'm being overly ambitious to think I could ever write anything remotely on a par with J.B.!

[Doogs]

Answer: YES.

Whichever works for you. For me, JUMP RIGHT IN is the only way I can do it. It's an individual preference. You have to find whichever one works for you. Or maybe you can find a balance between the two. There is no YES/NO answer. No absolutes.

This.

Everyone's different. KTC may jump right in. Others may research and outline.

Personally, I'm an outliner. But I start with a general frame (a synopsis, more or less), and only fill in the details at the beginning of each new chapter.

When I first started out, I tried jumping in. The result was a mess, but it taught me a good deal about myself and my approach to writing. As long as you're willing to stick it out, I don't think you can lose either way.

[Momento Mori]

I've done it both ways[/double entendre] and like every one else says, you have to do what feels right for you.

Personally, I've found that outlining has given me the confidence that I actually have a plot that works (i.e. A leads to B leads to C), so that as I write it, I know where I'm going. I also know that some mystery/thriller writers find big benefits from outlining from the outset because it helps them work out where they're going to place their clues (although note that there are also others who write without outlining first and then re-work as needs be during the editing process).

As someone else has said, the problem with outlining is that it can take away some of the spontaneity that comes from the actual writing process. The way I've tried to resolve that is to leave deliberate holes in the text, which I can flesh out when I get to that point (e.g. I might have a bit in my outline that says: "Bob finds out that Alice has been lying" which tells me that I need to deal with the revelation that Alice is a liar but gives me scope as to how Bob finds out and what he does when he discovers that fact).

My own take is that much of it depends on what kind of writer you are - e.g. do you start with a character or a situation or do you start with an idea? As a sweeping generalisation (that has no scientific evidence to support it at all), I wonder if people who start with a character find it more useful to just plunge straight into the writing so they can see how that character develops on the page and where s/he takes them whereas people who start with a situation or idea find it easier to sketch out in advance where they want to go with it. I'm throwing that up for discussion purposes rather than trying to claim it's a hard and fast rule. :)

MM

[NeuroFizz]

If you have the slightest notion that outlining stifles creativity, you may want to avoid it since it may well become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

As many have mentioned, you have to find what works best for you. Even though I don't outline now, I think your premise about it (stifling creativity) is total crap. It may lasso some people, but it never did that for me. And I'll still jot down ideas if I get in a sticky spot in a story.

Also, outlining and research are two very different animals. Doing the latter doesn't automatically include the former.

[CaroGirl]

There are as many answers to how to write a story as there are stories. It varies not only from writer to writer, but from story to story. The novels I've written so far I haven't outlined. I prefer to go by the seat of my pants, but that's not to say my next story won't need an outline. It just might. And if it does, then that's what I'll do.

[Simple Living]

I didn't read every response here, but I hope you found that you received as many different answers as there were people who responded.

Trial and error. One of the greatest things about writing is that there is no one right way to do it.

I found the method that works best for me this way. I jumped right in and just wrote and wrote and wrote. It wasn't working. I found writing forums and read what others did. I tried a few of their methods and found aspects in several of them that worked for me and combined them into a style and routine of my own.

It helps me tremendously to outline. I love the research I do while planning a story. Outlining helps me keep the big things in line. That said, I'm not obsessive about following my outline perfectly. That's where spontaneity and inspiration come in. Inspiration, I've found, comes after you start writing.

Then, I write my first drafts by hand. I was completely against this in the beginning because my hands would hurt. But, a respected writer on another website convinced me of the benefits of doing this. I can type quickly. Almost as quickly as I think. When you're typing that quickly, your brain doesn't have time to mull over the original thought, which is usually not the best way to go. By the time a thought has had time to go from your brain to your hand to the paper, your brain has time to mull it over a bit and, most often, your third or fourth version of that thought ends up being the better version. It's made me a better a writer and caused me to edit a lot less. I use my computer to edit and rewrite.

But, again, this is all personal opinion and what works best for me.

[GeorgieB]

I almost always develop some sort of outline because the idea that forms the germ for the story is usually not complete. I have to work through all the ins and outs that become the plot, if only to make sure there IS a story to be told.

Once the outline appears to be complete I begin writing. And every time I've found holes or opportunities that I missed the first time around. I've started with 5 or 6K outlines, complete with chapters, scenes, even some bits of conversation. Makes the writing process easier for me.

Hope that makes sense.

[dawinsor]

I'm an outliner myself, but a book I like a lot is James Scott Bell's Plot and Structure. In one chapter, he takes up the issue of outlining and, like most folks here, he acknowledges that different people need different ways of working. Still he urges those who hate outlines to at least do two things ahead of time.

First, be sure you have a lead character with an objective. Name those two things and then name the conflict that's keeps the character from reaching that objective. Then know what fabuously exciting ending scene you want to reach.

Second, write what sounds like the back cover copy for your book, a few paragraphs that excite your own interest and maybe that of some friends you try them out on. Say there are three paragraphs. The first one says something like "So and so is a San Francisco bookseller who specializes in historical novels." You give the character's background and normal world. The second paragraph starts with something like "suddenly" or "but when" and you shove your character into action and give a couple more sentences. The last paragraph maybe starts with "now" and gives action the character must undertake. Or perhaps it starts with "will" and asks some questions.

If you do those two things, you may have enough to start with.

[RLB]

Is it a new month already? These outline/wing it debates always creep up on me so fast!

But yeah, whatever works for you. I have a very general outline for my current WIP, but the story has already morphed into something completely unrecognizable.

[jasperd]

Okay....one thing is for sure. There is no sure way to do it.

I think from all the advice, I know what would work best for me. I actually have tried to write two novels when I was younger and somewhere in the middle of each novel, I had added too many characters and I just abandoned the books because the plot was too complicated.

So a very basic outline may be the best thing for me. I may even be able to re-hash those old stories with some minor outlining. Thanks again!

[Stew21]

Sounds like you know what you have to do.

Just for a sidenote though, I started off with too many characters one time and half way through the first draft realized they weren't necessary and I combined them into one character and added another to hold two more.
worked wonders for the book (it's still never going to see the light of day, but its a better write for it.) Revisit those old novels, combine the characters, write an outline, see if you can't breathe some life into that abandoned work.

[BruceJ]

start writing and see what happens. If at any point you feel you would benefit from an outline, stop and outline.
We can't tell you what is going to work best for you, only you know that.

I'm a by-the-seat person, so outlining doesn't work for me. I've tried it. If I outline, what i think I want a character to do is not at all what they should be doing. I don't find out until I write it. I like it that way. It feels more natural to me.
Makes two of us, Stew. I agree. I get inspired by the story line and the action, which is what makes me sit down and pound keys. I do have a timeline (mine's historical fiction) and I've had to readdress it as I went along to make sure I wasn't violating what c/would happen and what people would do at their ages, etc., but the joy for me is chasing the story line. I haven't had a major collision with logic or chronology yet, from the prologue to the series or with the first book of the series. Not to say that won't happen, though, just hasn't yet. :)

[jennifer75]

I want to start TONIGHT but I don't want to start something and have it turn out to be flat because I didn't plan enough. On the other hand, I don't want to over-analyze and stifle the spontaneity.


Personally, no outline has worked out for me for the most part. I'm writing based on a true story though. So it's all about my memory. I almost wish I had written an outline only because I forget what I've written and have to go back and see if I've covered something already.

I think if your imagination is active enough that you can float through without outlining, let it take you along for the journey.

[nessam]

There is a lot of good advice in this thread. I personally start with the plot/story and outline as I go. If something is in my head I don't want to stop and outline it.

[IThinkICan29]

Me: Hi, I'm ITHINK and I'm a reformed, obsessive outliner.
Group: Hi ITHINK

I've found that major outlining doesn't work for me. I get too distracted. I begin worrying more about how pretty the outline is and less about plugging away at the actual novel. After months and months of existing in outline hell, I quit cold turkey. I now limit myself to a one page path. I figure I can work everything else out along with the characters.

[ccarver30]

Outline shmoutline.

[CheshireCat]

Crap.

Didn't even make it to December.

*sighs*

[blacbird]

The Rain Man gave me two cures,
and he said, "Jump right in."
One was Texas medicine,
and the other was just railroad gin,
and like a fool I mixed them,
and it strangled up my mind.
Now people just get uglier,
and I have no sense of time.

-- Bob Dylan


caw

[David I]

The 'outline vs. spontaneity' debate looks like it has been with us - and on this forum - since the dinosaurs.
Search around on this site and you'll find lots of answers - and most of them saying that some people work better with outlines, and others just swim along with the tide.
You'll have to try it out yourself to see which side of the debate you fit in with.


Exactly. Though I repeat that some study quoted by some speaker at some conference claimed that 2/3 of published fiction writers outlined, 1/3 didn't. (I'm in the 1/3.)

But I think a lot of people are somewhere in between, or even not on the either/or scale.

Flounder through and find what works for you. And be warned--what works for on book may not work for another! (I'm sorry to be the one to break the news...)

[RLSMiller]

Outlining works great for me. Sometimes there are days when I don't actually have the energy to write, and it's on those days that I sometimes sit down and outline. All outlining is for me is thinking before hand, and pooling those thoughts on a piece of paper, rather than thinking during the writing process. I prefer to keep the two separate, so I can devote all my energies into coming up with a great story and plot during the outlining process, and then focus on writing to the best of my ability during the writing process. It took me a week to think up my initial outline, and it was a great excuse to take an hour each day just to muse about stuff. As I was studying for exams at the time, it fit perfectly into my schedule.

My last outline was only a two page document with three to four sentences on each chapter, just to give the story a framework for me to work in. I didn't outline all the tiny little details or anything. It was just a matter of being able to see the story in its entirety so I could be sure everything fit nicely into place. Also, it's nice being able to look at the pace of your story in an outline, and then adjust the writing according to that. If I wrote by the seat of the pants, I'd be stumbling through the dark and I'd probably end up needing a few rewrites and much longer editing periods to work out all the kinks in the plot. As things stand, editing for me is just a matter of cutting excess verbiage and making sure sentences flow well. It's such a relief not to have to worry about the plot not clicking right. I know some people are capable of plotting and writing simultaneously, but for me it's better to keep them separate.

Still, outlining doesn't mean I'm not receptive to spontaneity. Quite often I'll think of something better than what I had outlined while I'm writing. In those cases, I just adapt to suit the new idea. For me, it's not a matter of sticking to it rigidly, it's just about giving me a loose path to follow so I don't sit at the PC and procrastinate all the time (which I probably would without an outline). If I find a shortcut during the writing process, or think of a more scenic route to take, then I'll take it. I'll never stunt a story's evolution just to satisfy an outline.

I will say one last thing, though. Having an outline made writing the synopsis far easier than it would have been without one. I had all the relationships, climaxes and plot twists already mapped out, so I didn't have to scour through the book trying to remember things. And as I understand it, professional writers sometimes sell books based on outlines/synopsis, so I'm happy that it won't be a daunting prospect if I'm ever asked to produce one.

[KarlaErikaCal]

I jumped right in on my first novel. I did finish it, and I'm quite proud of it, but it was bothersome trying to write when I had writer's block. And with writer's block I end up giving up on the whole thing, but its a good thing I stuck through with it, 'cause its definitely a major accomplishment for me being only sixteen.

I started an outline of a new novel after I wrote a scene about a dream I had. It's been working out just fine. If i come up with more scenes I'll write it in another document. Sometimes I'll even write a scene in the outline itself if I'm writing something that I can write dialogue to.

Which one do I prefer? I realized I prefer outlining, but like others said, try outlining and see if it works for you. I did and outlining seems like the best thing for me.

Good luck!

[Gray Rose]

You have to take some time to figure what works for you. I mostly outline in my head - there's a kind of movie narrative going on there constantly, plus I outline in my notebook, chapter by chapter. I also have one map and one character chart which shows how my characters are connected to each other. Unlike many others, I do not use character sheets - why bother? If I drew a character sheet of my close friends, it would not help me get into their head. I write exercises for all of my major characters, which are mostly situations from their past.

I never try to figure out where I'm going when I sit down to do the actual writing. When I write I know very well where that particular piece is headed and what the scenes are like. It's just that I don't plan too far ahead.

Good luck with your writing!

[jenstrikesagain]

Yes.

Actually I've done it both ways and I think it's best to do something in between. Have a sketch of where you eventually plan to go and then start writing, just don't be at all surprised if you end up somewhere else.

Which doesn't really consist of much useful advice so I'll fess up and say I've been so busy over at NaNoWriMo that I haven't been around much and I missed everybody and just wanted to say hi. HI EVERYBODY!!!

[GerriB]

I am an insane outliner. I start off with copious worldbuilding and plot notes. Then I nail down my beginning and end. After that, I do a spew outline where I put down in approximate order what will happen in the story. Next, it's the scene list outline. And then it's the plot-character-theme outline where I write a paragraph on each angle. The last stage is a detailed scene outline. Then I write the scene.

Did I mention I'm an insane outliner? :D Seriously, though, I do this process because I like control. By the time I write the scene, I have the story completely formed, and I'm not going all over the place following random leads and such. All that discovery that many people love in their writing, I do in the outlining phase, and I still have a chunk to come in the writing.

All that being said...This is a method I've developed over time, trial and error, and lots of false starts. I've tried the organic method, and lasted maybe 12 pages before I went screaming off into the sunset, never to return to that end of the spectrum again. The whole "If I outline, I lose interest" (completely valid) reason that organic people tell me about simply isn't an issue for me. The more outlining I do, the more I want to tell the story.

Experimentation is necessary to find out your personal method. Dive in. If that doesn't work, then do a sketchy outline. If that's not enough, start adding details until the process works. Whatever works for you. *shakes pompoms*

[scarletpeaches]

Oh Christ on a f***ing bike.

[ishtar'sgate]

And be warned--what works for on book may not work for another! (I'm sorry to be the one to break the news...)
I think you're probably right on this. I didn't use an outline for my first novel but my second is more tightly bound to historical events. It'll be a very loose outline, though. I don't work well in a straight jacket.:D
Linnea