# Do you outline?



## Dwarven Gold (Feb 10, 2011)

Do you outline a book before writing, or just run with it?  Does it make a difference?


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## Juiceman (Feb 10, 2011)

Personally before any project I like to brainstorm a bit and write everything down, no matter how good or bad it may seem when reviewing.  After getting a general idea of where I would like to go, outlines have been very helpful so far.

While I do have a desire to be a little more liberal when it comes to the flow of a story idea, my organizational side just isn't satisfied with doing things on the fly.  I guess my personal shyness wants to put forth what I can as a solid piece of work so that I don't feel like my point is missed.

I have noticed so many times when producing anything in my life that organization and perfectionism have caused me to do a lit of unnecessary things.  

I always did my homework on scrap paper, then recopied it for my final copy.  This wasn't graded homework just every day stuff.

In college I wanted to produce the best videos I could at then, and that meant lots of extra hours in the editing bays.

Even today when designing websites, I never seem to be satisfied so I will go back and make changes.

Heck, when I publish our weekly church bulletin I cannot stand seeing that I even overlooked an underlined period at the end of a sentence.

Hmm.  Fantasy writing may not be the best thing for me; I will continue to focus on writing for the screen.


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## Juiceman (Feb 10, 2011)

Yes.  I just noticed some grammatical and punctuational errors in my above post; but my iPod won't let me scroll in order to edit.  Darn.


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## Vita Numinous (Feb 10, 2011)

I am working on a cowritten project with a friend and that stuff is outlined like crazy, very detailed, so we can trade off chapters and editing effectively.  Well, as effectively as possible.  ; )  As for my other projects, it totally depends.  I'll usually start right into something after some reasearch and daydreaming time, but sometimes in the course of working on a piece I realize I'm getting scattered, and pause to make something of a rough outline.  It might just be a bulleted list of reminders, or (much more rarely) it can become a rather large dictation to work from.  It all depends on what I feel I need for a piece, and how well it's coming along.  If I'm getting very sidetracked into subplots I don't need or having trouble bringing in things I do need, it's outline time.


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## Ravana (Feb 10, 2011)

For me, it depends on what I have to start with. Generally, I get an idea for a section of a piece (often but not always the beginning), write down as much of it as I have, and make notes on ideas for other sections as they come to me–including doing so while I'm writing the aforementioned section. Once I've taken something as far as it will go for the moment, I may back off and outline the rest, depending on what else I've come up with and/or what else I think I'm going to need. For longer works, this may be necessary; for shorter ones, it may not, as what goes where may simply be obvious from what else is going to be required to complete the work.

What I almost never do is _start_ by outlining. Not that there's anything wrong with that; it's just not how I work. In teaching basic writing, I actually avoid emphasizing outlines as an initial step: I recommend brainstorming, then selecting from the results the things you think are going to be most useful to you, _then_ placing those in a basic outline form. I've discovered that most beginning writers are intimidated by outlines; worse, that they have been led, by previous teachers or their own misconceptions about how writing "has to" work, to believe that once an outline is finished, it's set in stone and you can't diverge from it. Nonsense. You can always change things: adding new items, removing things that no longer seem necessary, moving sections about, and so on. Outlines are basically only there for you to keep track of what you have done and what you still need to do… and the outline itself should be revised continuously as you make those changes. Also, outlines don't need to be in any specific format: just develop one that does what you need it to. Remember, it's a tool, and only a tool: treat it as such. There's more than one way to attach two boards together (nails, screws, bolts, pegs, glue, interlocking); you use the tools appropriate to the job. 

One thing I do recommend: once you think you're done with a piece, go back through it and write an outline _then_–of what you actually have down. Nothing is better at showing you whether or not you've covered everything that needs covered, and whether or not it's in the order it needs to be. Particularly in this age of cut-and-paste, it's amazing how easy it is to get sections out of position as you work–and it's quite possible, even when rereading drafts, to miss such problems: you know what you intended, so your mind fills in things that aren't actually there, or that you know are present in the story somewhere but which may in fact not be in the sequence your reader is going to need them to be. Doing an outline on a completed piece forces you to attend to what you _actually_ have down, as opposed to what you _think_ you have down.


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## Dwarven Gold (Feb 12, 2011)

I've never made an outline.  When I get a story idea, I just run with it.  We dwarves are natural sprinters.  Very dangerous over short distances.


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## At Dusk I Reign (Feb 12, 2011)

Dwarven Gold said:


> When I get a story idea, I just run with it.


This tends to be my approach. I make notes of course, but only of the most basic variety, and nothing's written in concrete. I can't imagine anything more dull than knowing in advance what your characters will do or say. It obviously works for some people, though, best-sellers included.


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## Donny Bruso (Feb 12, 2011)

I have tried different ways. My biggest success was writing a general plot outline for competing in NaNoWriMo last year. I was all excited to work on the story, but couldn't because the contest hadn't started yet. So I sat down and wrote a very general four page outline that carried me for almost 60,000 words. Not putting down, 'character A says this in response to character B' but just things like 'character A sees this, which triggers X, Y, & Z, so he does W'. Did I stick to it? Partially. Sometimes the characters just will not do what the outline says they should, in which case I run with it. Sometimes it totally destroys your plot and leaves you scrambling to pick up the pieces. Sometimes it opens doors you couldn't have consciously thought up no matter how long you started at the screen.


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## Meg the Healer (Feb 26, 2011)

I tend to run with it. But sometimes I wish I outlined - just so my thoughts wouldn't seem so scattered. Since my book keeps evolving as I do - outlining becomes very difficult for me. (It's not as if I can outline my own life). But I have a general idea that I have written down so at least I've become a little more focused.....and I'm not changing my main characters anymore.


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## Donny Bruso (Feb 27, 2011)

Hehe, don't you hate that? You get a few chapters in a suddenly you realize one of your supporting cast is ten times more interesting than your lead and is constantly upstaging them...


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## Chilari (Feb 27, 2011)

When I think of an idea, I like to get right into it, but this generally doesn't last long so after a scene or two I end up starting to plan a little, and then, if I like the story, I plan some more, look at worldbuilding, maybe try the snowflake method for a few steps, start writing again and get a little further, then return to planning, work through some kinks, change things, add scenarios or additional factors which will influence the way the characters approach things, and once I'm happy with all of that, that's when the real first draft really begins, sometimes with short sections - a few paragraphs, a line of dialogue - from the false starts. Even then it doesn't always get far. I've only completed a first draft once.


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## Ophiucha (Feb 27, 2011)

I do a bit of worldbuilding, and incidentally, am forced to plan elements of the character and story so that the world appropriately reflects upon those themes necessary to further the plot. But I definitely focus far more on the semantic details than the focus of the story. I have a pretty rough idea of the final world before I start writing, but the plot can go in any which direction. As an example, my current project had no less than three different main characters before I settled on the one I'm working on, but the only thing that has changed about the world it is set in is how the magic works, and even then only certain elements of it. It still comes from the same source, and is returned to it in the same fashion.


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## JCFarnham (Feb 28, 2011)

Frankly if I didn't worldbuild and outline I think I would find myself writing without much drive and focus. Combined those two techniques really hammer home the all important details and that should hopefully ensure a focused, non-drivel-based book.

Plus World building, etc is half the fun right.

Of course that doesn't mean there's no room for the flowing, ever changing plot that people seem to advocate. I'm a firm believer in letting characters surprise you.


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## Legerdemain (Feb 28, 2011)

Ophiucha said:


> I do a bit of worldbuilding, and incidentally, am forced to plan elements of the character and story so that the world appropriately reflects upon those themes necessary to further the plot.


 
I agree with Ophiucha here, in that I do not know what or who I am writing a story about until I invent them into their own surroundings.  My main character, in a similar fashion, went from a side story character to my main character after I found him to be more interesting as I was fleshing out the background.



JCFarnham said:


> Frankly if I didn't worldbuild and outline I think I would find myself writing without much drive and focus...  ...Plus World building, etc is half the fun right...



I am the same way, as without building I cannot get excited about the characters.  I find myself asking and answering more questions until I find the story's been written.

Hawthorne wrote many of his stories using extensive outlines, and after taking a course devoted to his work "The Scarlet Letter" I can say it sometimes works marvelously. It is very systematic, and if your brain doesn't like to be structured, it may be difficult to write that way.


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## Calash (Mar 3, 2011)

I try to setup a rough plot line for my projects.  Usually I already have a world built for the story so I end up with a good structure to start with.

That being said some of my most entertaining writings have come from the "Early morning, half groggy, idea in the shower" method.  The story will just come out and then it is a race to get it on some form of paper before the ideas fade.  Usually I end up rewriting a few times but the results end up being very interesting


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## Annie (Mar 4, 2011)

I do. I like to outline and brainstorm my projects before I start. I like to create 'character profiles' too. It helps me alot, but some of the time I don't stick to the plan as I come up with better ideas.


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## Mdnight Falling (Mar 5, 2011)

That truly depends on your memory skills. I brain storm, nothing major. I write down ideas, usually about a sentence or two long. Then I put them in the order I want them... Each one or two sentence brain storm goes from being an idea into a whole chapter of the book. After I figure out what I want I let my mind go and the book work it's magic and flow how it will. Sometimes the idea I wanted is there, sometimes it isn't. But no matter what the chapter ends up saying, the one or two lines I wrote to start off the the idea of that chapter are always evident even if they aren't the main aspect of it like I wanted


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## The Realm Wanderer (Apr 25, 2011)

I don't so much outline as I do plan absolutely everything that's going to be integral to the story - Characters, locations, items/objects, motifs, backstories, journeys, character interactions, witty comments, simple chapter summaries etc.
I don't know why but whenever I start a project (like the one I'm working on now) I open up Microsoft Office PowerPoint and just start planning. Usually a slide for each section, but often a few more than that (quite a few) is required.


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## Sigillimus (Apr 25, 2011)

I'm attempting to outline my fantasy novel for the June Novel Writing Month that is going on around here, and it's going pretty well so far. I'm getting deeper than normal, writing histories, cultures and whatnot. I'm also drawing the map before I get started so I don't get confused and mismatch locations when I'm writing. 

Overall, I'm really satisfied with my outlining process and I can't wait to put it into practice.


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