Building a story

[Drasn]

How does everyone go about building their story? I know it's different for everyone, but I'm looking for possible ideas on work flow. I used to use the sit down and write a story method, no outline, no planning other than my thoughts. That worked great for short stories and the like, however I started work on a longer story and I find it's very easy to write yourself into corners or just get bored when you run out of that initial "idea high".

I'm trying out a new method at the moment. I wrote a paragraph synopsis about where I want the story to begin then I wrote another paragraph of where I want the story to end. I am now going through and writing a brief synopsis of each of the chapters. I did the major turning point in the story chapters first and now I am doing the "getting from one point to the next" chapters. This seems to be a bit better fro me as I am constantly changing from one scene to the next, not feeling forced to spend too much time on a scene. I plan to continually expand each chapter a bit at a time, turning the one paragraph into two. Building the story from the inside out I guess. At the end of the phase I should have a decent first draft to work with, the writing all chapters simultaneously seems to help me keep track of everything better.

My question is this, is there a better way? I get too distracted if I start world building, so I try to keep the building in an as needed status(but once something is put in it becomes permanent for consistency). If I do an outline I loose interest in the story quickly(I know what I'm doing now is basically outlining, but it feels different). I would really like to be able to finish without loosing interest in the story, because it seems that once that happens the writing becomes bland and dry.

Anyway, thanks in advance for any responses.

 

[Jabrosky]

How does everyone go about building their story? I know it's different for everyone, but I'm looking for possible ideas on work flow. I used to use the sit down and write a story method, no outline, no planning other than my thoughts. That worked great for short stories and the like, however I started work on a longer story and I find it's very easy to write yourself into corners or just get bored when you run out of that initial "idea high".

This seems to be true for me too. In my own experience "pantsing" works great for short stories, but since novels have a lot more going on, they require more planning. Howeve, one major drawback to the planning approach is that it can feel constraining.

 

[T.Allen.Smith]

We seem to work in a similar fashion. I do outline but I keep my outlines restricted to character lists and sketches, geography, religions, ethnicities, etc (general world info).
As I'm working on these outlines, I'm constantly writing down scene ideas in another document. When I start to fizzle out on the outlines that comprise the world building I know it's time to write.
The key for me concerning these world outlines is to keep them very vague (with the exception of POV character sketches which need more detail). I'm not vain enough to believe that the ideas I started with will all carry thru to the story end unchanged. Most ideas change over the course of the actual writing. Few remain the same. Some are cut completely.
So, my work style is a combination of outlining general world characters & features and leaving these open enough to encourage discovery writing. This helps me stay organized & focused while at the same time engaged in the same story because I'm not sure where it will all take me.

 

[Devor]

I typed out my process here, if it helps.

 

[Alex97]

Usualy I'll do a lor of world building and then build a story into that world whilst writing a little and changing things where appropriate.

 

[SlimShady]

Step 1. Think up characters. Including protagonist and antagonist.

Step 2. Think up a place to put them in. (Often involves quite a bit of world building as I truly look to immerse the reader into my world.) Honestly I probably put more time in world building then actually writing.

Step 3. Craft the main plot and sketch out the sub-plots. I also often have to plot down to the very detail or I will find myself lost in the writing with know where to go. After this I finally start writing.

Step 4. Repeat.

 

[J. S. Elliot]

I'm the type of person who can world build for months, and by the time I'm ready to start, I have more than just the one idea I started with. (They breed like rabbits, really.) But then I have enough to keep me going for quite some time. And because of the extensive work prior to starting, there is less need to go back and double check to make sure things are consistent.

 

[SlimShady]

I'm the type of person who can world build for months, and by the time I'm ready to start, I have more than just the one idea I started with. (They breed like rabbits, really.) But then I have enough to keep me going for quite some time. And because of the extensive work prior to starting, there is less need to go back and double check to make sure things are consistent.

I know exactly what you mean. I have so many ideas bouncing around that I can spend days just fleshing them out, while no work gets done at all on my main project. But, I believe new ideas are a writer's gold mine.

Anyways let me get back on topic. Truly their is no right or wrong way to building a story. Everyone has there own way and whatever works for YOU is what you need to do. Some people will tell you world building is time wasting, however others will say that the more immersive the world is then the greater the story. Whatever works for you as a writer is what you need to focus on.

 

[T.Allen.Smith]

I somewhat subscribe to the Sanderson philosophy that "ideas are cheap" & writers should be writing.
Record them but don't get bogged dogged down with them either.

 

[Drasn]

I'm the type of person who can world build for months, and by the time I'm ready to start, I have more than just the one idea I started with. (They breed like rabbits, really.) But then I have enough to keep me going for quite some time. And because of the extensive work prior to starting, there is less need to go back and double check to make sure things are consistent.

The power of world building is amazing, however in my case I get very drawn in to the details of the world. Before I know it twelve months have gone by and I have a collection of hand drawn maps, a detailed history of cities and countries, I have created cultures and even economies for the peoples of the world. Yet, after all that I still haven't written a single word of an actual story. I blame my D&D DM days.

I really don't have a problem with coming up with ideas. My biggest problem is fleshing out that idea into a finished project, I have a bad habit of getting side tracked and end up working on around nine to ten different projects at once. I'm really trying to figure out how to stay focused on one project, because the multiple project system just doesn't work for me. I end up with some brilliantly crafted beginnings of stories that lose focus quickly and are forgotten altogether.

 

[Drasn]

I somewhat subscribe to the Sanderson philosophy that "ideas are cheap" & writers should be writing.
Record them but don't get bogged dogged down with them either.

Just watched a video of Sanderson on youtube titled Lecture 1 Ideas are Cheap. I think I may watch the series that's posted to see if he gives more insight on combining the "mystical writing" and "chopping block" writing. I think one of biggest problems is when I hit that slow "chopping block" portion I start daydreaming about better ideas and come up with one or two, which in turn causes me to lose focus on the original. I guess I need to learn to deal with the slow, hard part of the writing and forget all the other ideas that show themselves until I learn to manage it better.

 

[Devor]

I somewhat subscribe to the Sanderson philosophy that "ideas are cheap" & writers should be writing.
Record them but don't get bogged dogged down with them either.

If ideas are a dime a dozen, then a novel would still cost several hundreds of dollars.

It's not that I disagree, it's that I think it's too easy to brush off the value of a good idea. There's so many people trying to write who cannot seem to spot one.

 

[T.Allen.Smith]

That's why I stated that I somewhat subscribe to the notion that ideas are cheap. A good idea and originality can carry a lot of weight.
However, when the search for an idea or too much world building become the focus instead of the writing.... That's when there is a problem.

 

[Helen]

There's so many people trying to write who cannot seem to spot one.

IMO it's not that they can't spot ideas, it's that they don't know how to turn an idea into a story.

 

[Devor]

IMO it's not that they can't spot ideas, it's that they don't know how to turn an idea into a story.

Well, there is that. But I was referring to completed stories I've seen which do not seem to have found a good idea in two hundred pages. I've actually seen the book leading into a situation, stopped and wrote down a list of six random things I thought would happen, and saw five of them show up.

 

[Penpilot]

Outside of basic world building. My process is constructed on the backs of three things. First a screen writing book called Save The Cat. It breaks things down into 15 major story beats that all stories have among other things. Second Dan Well's 7 point plot structure method I found on youtube, and third the Scenes and Sequel structure. Here's a link to a post with the links to information on the latter two tools I use. http://mythicscribes.com/forums/nanowrimo/3618-ms-blood-pact-planning.html#post45202