I Love You, But You Were Killing My Book

June 30, 2008

I am such a louse. I did start Day 16 back on the 23rd as promised. But then I didn’t touch it again until Friday. I got a lot done Friday, and more on Sunday. But as of now, I’ve only put three days into this 9-day phase, so let me apologize to those following along for not making this a bigger priority.

So tomorrow will be day 19 of the plan, and I swear that I will work on the novel. I’m going to work straight through on these next several days until we hit Day 24 NO MATTER WHAT!!!

Hold me to that!

For now though, I want to talk about what I did on Friday:

I’m sure plenty of writers would prefer to do their outlining in a word processor. I’m a by-hand kinda gal. I figured out the estimated number of scenes given the length I’m targeting (which I based on similar titles in the genre) - that’s 72 scenes.

So I printed up 72 pages of the formatted outline capsule included in First Draft in 30 Days, and finally assembled all of my preliminary work with these formatted outline pages in a new binder.

Then, I cheated.

Yes. Cheated!

I think one of the reasons I was having such a hard time convincing myself to make time for this phase is that I was dreading doing things exactly as laid out step-by-step.

Why?

Because I knew after re-reading all of a few times that it just wasn’t how I worked. I, for example, had no inclination to put together the outline, then go back and label my plot threads in it - and I had no inclination to write it all up, and then go back adding things from the character and setting sketches. It just wouldn’t work for me.

But as I said to the author in a comment on a recent post here, that’s OK. Programs like this are nice because you can cheat a bit and make it work better for your own writing and outlining style. I don’t feel badly about “cheating” anymore (despite the fact that I wanted to do it all as-it-was-written for your sake with the comparisons).

So yes. I love you guys and gals. But focusing on what I wanted to do for your review was killing my enthusiasm for both my book and the potential for the First Book in 30 Days plan. So I cheated, and I finally feel refreshed because of that - and now we can resume.

How did I cheat?

I’ve mentioned here that I used the Marshall Plan for a past outline and loved it. So I took a few elements of that plan, and worked them into this plan - it allows me to address the same things in the same time frame, only in a different order that better suits me.

In this case, I went through the 72 scene sheets / formatted outline capsule pages, and pre-planned the structure for my plot threads and viewpoint characters.

Why do this?

It works for the way I write. Rather than going back after the outline’s together to make sure I’ve addressed all sub-plots, I can’t ignore them for too long this way. It keeps everything flowing, and I’ll have constant reminders in front of me to change the focus when I’m supposed to.

When it comes down to writing, I might write 30 or more pages in a day one day and almost nothing the next. On days where I have my writing groove on, having things like this pre-planned keeps me from getting too inside of one character or one character’s story.

It wouldn’t work for everyone. I don’t use it rigidly - if something doesn’t feel natural, I can swap placements without an issue while I’m working. If I realize I need to add a scene focusing on the heroine’s sub-plot, I know immediately that I also have to move whatever I’m replacing in the timeline, and that it still all has to “work.”

I don’t know if that makes a lot of sense. Basically, I’m just doing my plot thread marking before I do the bulk of the formatted outline - just rearranging the order a bit.

The benefit is that it brought up issues - I still needed to add more tension to the middle of the book (which I realized as I was looking at the number of scenes devoted to each plot line), and it made me realize that a previously very minor character actually had what it takes to be a viewpoint character in the story (and just the one to add some of that extra tension!). Given the planned length, another viewpoint character is actually a good thing too - I’m hoping she’ll help to liven it up a bit and help things flow a bit more. I was really not happy with the plans for the middle of the book previously.

So yay for getting my butt back to work on this, and for finally getting out of my rut. Making the process “my own” is an important part of this I think, and now that I’m allowing myself to do that a little bit more, I think it’s going to move along nicely.

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