the woes of a writer

[edenfalling]

Am working on the last scene of "Secrets" chapter 7. I have almost completely bollixed up my outline by this point -- part of what I intended to write already happened in chapter 6 (chapters 6 and 7 were originally intended to be only one chapter), and some other stuff I'd neglected to think about has suddenly become important. Bother bother bother.

Oh well. The Ginny-Tom interaction is laying groundwork for later developments including the confrontation in the Chamber itself, and I also managed to get Ginny vaguely curious about Percy's personal life, which will be useful later on when she finds him and Penelope snogging in an empty classroom. And it had the side benefit of getting Percy to the library on Sunday morning, where he will run into Harry and inadvertently send him off to Myrtle's bathroom, which is canon. So that's all good.

It always amuses me to compare my outlines to my finished chapters -- you can see how I got from one to the other, but I always go off track somewhere along the line. I don't really mind much afterward -- the new stuff is usually better than what I'd originally planned -- but it's irritating in process.

Comments

[edenfalling]

I've given up on writing stories without outlines... well, with the obvious exception of the 15-minute things. I don't always follow them very well -- spontaneous inspiration and stubborn characters can play merry hell with my plans -- but it's handy to have a couple road-signs reminding me that I need to hit points B, L, and R on my way from A to Z.

Besides, that way I do the messiest flailing around for a plot before I'm actually trying to write coherent sentences and dialogue, instead of at the same time. Which saves a LOT of grief on my part, perfectionist that I am. I want to get the story right the first time, and it's hard enough beating that impulse down when I know where the action's going. It used to get really nasty back when I didn't use outlines -- I'd just freeze up half a page into a story and never get further than that.

Outlines are good. I like outlines. They don't work for everyone, but they're a godsend for me.

(And your stories are fine! I guess you're one of the lucky people who doesn't have to plan things out beforehand.)

[annearchy.livejournal.com]

Well the only reason I don't plan things before hand is because I rarely write more than about 10,000 words. I can hold that kind of story in my head pretty well, but anything longer than that, forget it. I can appreciate the need for an outline for a longer fic. If I had any actual long plots in my brain, I'm sure I'd need to use an outline too.

[edenfalling]

You can keep a 10,000 word story straight in your head without an outline? *is madly impressed* I start wanting one somewhere between 800 and 2,000 words.