It took me a long time to come around to outlining. I love spreadsheets, and little notebooks full of nicely organized information, and timelines, but not outlines. There is something wrong, I always felt, in outlining fiction. Shouldn’t fantasy be allowed to simply flow?
That said, I did usually have some sort of ten-sentence plan. As I went along, happily typing away, the plan expanded as I hit on brief flashes of inspiration. Eventually, those flashes got longer and longer. Near the end, I’d be writing the finishing paragraphs and the chapters leading up to them at the same time. It was a sort of plot dyslexia. The resulting product didn’t sell.
So, I decided to switch it up for Soulless. Urban fantasy was a sub-genre departure for me, out of my comfort zone, so why not try a new writing style as well? After all, outlines worked perfectly for academic essays. I was so strict with myself I actually had certain events scheduled to occur on specific page numbers. It was really difficult and it worked disastrously well, particularly for pacing.
Way back at the dawn of the deal, I was unexpectedly asked for a treatment for the second book. (“Oh,” I thought at the time, “I’m writing a second book? Who knew?”) So I cooked up this page of ideas, which everyone seemed to like. And then I realized I had written myself right back into another outline situation. It was slightly less hard the second time around, and it worked again. So I did it a third. I’ll let you know if that worked in a couple months.
I’m not saying every writer should outline but I do think it’s worth trying just to see what happens. Who knows, you could end up with an unexpected series. I, for one, welcome my outline overlord.
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Soulless hits shelves Oct 1, 2009.
Hi Gail,
I did pretty much the same for my first two books — which were a disaster and of course didn’t sell. No outlines to speak of, and it showed.
Then I went to what I’d learned in screenwriting and did scene cards, making brief notes on what I wanted to happen. Then I shuffled the scenes around and it really improved my pacing. I also mark my love/sex scenes in pink and then make sure they are nicely spaced in the book in between the action scenes. Really helps pacing.
So, I’m very much in favor of outlining.
Finally Soulless will be in Kindle tomorrow. Can’t wait.
Best,
Tina