Mix before baking: On dreaming up fiction

Yes. I don't usually start writing till I have the basics in my head. I can often look like I have writer's block. a large percentage of writing is choosing what will go in the scenes. Just rambling and direction-less writing is a waste of energy to me. I've been writing more than 10 years though. When I just started, I had more faith in just writing anything and hoping a story would show up. It never did so I now rely on planning. It seems to work much better. I don't agree when someone says that outlines are the death of writing. That is like saying schematics and blueprints are the death of art or architecture. I feel they are the birth of individual work, not the death of it. It could be the death of stream of thought writing, or of impressionistic writing, but that's not the writing I follow.

For me, I have to know how the story ends before I can start writing it. I'll get the idea, but I won't start writing it down until I have it all worked out in my head. Then I'll do a point form outline and start thinking up characters.

My outlines are really flexible, sometimes they're just a list of things I want to happen in the story. I use them mostly to remind me of where the story is going and how it ends.

I've tried in the past to just run with a story based on a character or the beginning of an idea, but they've never worked for me.

With baking I can be very creative and just throw things together. But with writing I need to follow the recipe.

I come up with my most creative ideas while lying in bed before falling asleep and in the morning when I first wake up. I used to keep a journal by the bed, but found it was too much work when I was drifting off to sleep to turn on the lights and write things down. So I got one of those little voice activated digital recorders just for that purpose.

It can also make for some interesting listening when you realize you've forgotten to turn it off.

I have tried both so far.
I took off writing, then really wasnt sure where I was going so I went back and outlined.
And took off writing again.

And now I am trying to establish if I even have anything resembling a story arc

I've had a mix of all of the above.

I just got an idea for a new story by looking at a picture of my great-grandmother when she was a young woman. I'm turning over more ideas to flesh it out right now, and when I'm done with that process, I'll write up a synopsis or an outline (depending on what comes out of my mental agitation process). I'll set it aside until I'm finished with my current WIP.

I have two other pieces that are in a fleshed out outline form or synopsis stage, a couple of half-finished novels I may never get back to, and a half-edited novella. All of those (with the exception of the synopsis/outline pieces) were dreamed up before I decided that this was the way to go for me. That's about a year's worth of work. *shrug*

It really all depends, I guess.

I don't really plan for short stories, I just write and go, although I'm planning on having a somewhat solid outline with some research done when I start my novel. I'd like to just wing it there, but I'm already having some problems with advancing the story with a novelette I'm writing so a novel like that would probably a disaster.

scheherazade said:

ARGH. I need an idea, I think. When you come up with ideas, do you tend to start with a character (eg. passive-aggressive sister-in-law), or a scene (eg. two people trapped in a cabin in a snowstorm), or a concept (eg. a triathlete decides to sail solo around the world, but then finds out he is the only match for his kidney-needing abusive father; cue flashbacks)? Or do you have another approach?

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Interesting question. Looking at my story ideas (one sentence vignettes I've written in a file) it seems about 1/2 character-originated, 1/4 concept, 1/4 scenes + a smattering of theme based story ideas (e.g. government is bad)

I started with a character, fully formed and ready to meet the page.

In reality I had tried to right a memoir but it made me an emotional wreck so a fiction version has allowed me to distance myself somewhat and has kept me much saner as there is more play room and less reliving this way.

Unfortunately my whole story/novel/plot(?) now is based simply on this character with lots of little mini-conflicts and other characters centered around her but no real, concrete, easily defined storyline (query letters are going to be nightmare I think )

That being said I likely shouldn't even be replying to threads such as this as I have never been published.

Does Uncle Jim have a thread on this?

I worked out my first 10 chapters. Once I got to that point I just kept writing and saw what happened. It helped becuse I couldn't seem to look too far ahead with it. But now I plan to plot the next 10 chapters, as it does help.

If I'm just writing a story, I'll usually skip planning and see what comes as I go along. If I don't like it, the work is short enough to scrap and start over. If I'm writing anything longer, I wouldn't even start without knowing where I'm heading.

I'd have to say I usually start with an idea or an image.

I woke up one morning with the image of a woman dressed in white staring down into a pool of clear water, the body of a man dressed in black armour lying just below the surface of the water. From that image I developed a rather long fantasy story that is turning into a novel.

My current WIP came to me while I was driving east on the 401 towards Kingston. It was really foggy out and I started "what iffing". By the time I got to Kingston I had the whole story worked out in my head.

Ideas tend to come easily to me - developing them is a whole other story.

I have to have some sort of plan before I begin writing. Depending on what the idea is, and if it's a short story or a novel or a poem, I might let it sit for a while before acting. I ususally write down at least something before I get to the actual story writing, but for short stories I don't always have to as long as I have the idea fully formed enough. As long as I know where I'm going to end up eventually, I am okay. It doesn't always have to be the perfect idea for the end, but I need something, and I need to know the end before I get past half through the middle. I go back and more thoroughly outline after I'm actually done.

I do lots and lots of thinking about any given thing though. I let the characters run loose in my head while I'm in the shower, before I go to bed, whilst in transit (but never if I'm driving--that would be reallly, really bad), or while doing boring work that requires no actual thought. Occasionally when I zone out of a conversation that consists mostly of the other person talking at me. Some of the things I discover about them while doing that won't make it into the story or the writing, but I have to know them before I start, because I need the springboard. If the details are important to the character or I just don't get lazy I'll write it down in a character bio of some sort somewhere, just because I might forget. Details in a profile don't do me good if I can't internalize them for the character, which I do need to do if I'm going to write them, but forgetting them means I won't be able to re-internalize them later, which is not good. I continue doing that all even as I write, though, so it's not strictly something for before writing.

There's a saying - "measure twice, cut once" - that usually applies to carpentry and other related pursuits, but that I feel applies equally well to writing. If you know what you're doing and where you're going ahead of time, getting there is usually a lot less painful.

Back in high school and college, I used to get some great idea for a novel and just start writing. And I would invariably get a little ways in before the story would run away from me. It was only after I started thinking about writing as work (fun and rewarding work, but work) that I buckled down and began to plan. And it's amazing the world of difference it makes when your writing has a direction.

My current approach is to get as much of the background research as I can out of the way up front, as well as the overall skeleton of the story, the principal characters, major happenings, etc. These get mapped into chapters, and then I start writing. At the start of each new chapter, I pull back into planning mode, fleshing out how the story goes from point A to point B. Then it's back to writing. I've found it works well for me, and that the intermittent planning gives me a few days to recharge for the next round of writing.

But hey, everyone's different, and what works for one may not work for others...

I have to talk to the characters a lot.

Sometimes we go off in Chaotic Fantasy Mode and Story Happens.

i usually prefer to have a skeleton first, and fill in the meat as i go along. with fantasy, i like the skeleton to be as solid as possible. with realistic YA fiction, i tend to rely more on characters and let them tell me what they want to do. a backbone, if you will.

i will say that, either way, writing is a discovery process. if it's based on concept, i spend the whole story getting to know my characters... they're constantly surprising me, and i'm always learning new things about them based on the situations i decide to put them in.

but if it's based on a character, i'm constantly discovering my own story!

I do a lot of planning before I write my novel. I will make a two page outline and list all the major characters and a rough plot. From that I go into a 60+ page outline and 6-page character interviews for all characters. Then, I do all the necessary research. Then I write.

My ideas usually tend to come from an scene. Then I build the protagonist and antagonist around the scene. Then I build the plot around the scene and the characters. However, normally the scene that gave me the idea doesn't even end up in my book.

I let a lot of the planning go on in my subconscious, by doing things that allow my conscious mind--especially that old devil right brain--to rest. It's meditation, but not in a lotus position, mantra chanting sort of way. What works best for me is pulling weeds in my garden while listening to Tchaikovsky through a pair of noise-cancelling headphones. Second best is a long, brisk walk, also while listening to Tchaikovsky. Even if inspiration doesn't always come right away, it feels like time well spent.

When I start a new story idea I usually write a lot of the ideas for it down in notebooks and on notecards. I come up with lists for the story, setting details and character sketches (words not pictures). I usually keep the plot in my head until I have a character or two well defined enough to drive the story.

I write serial stories, which basically means that the next story (sequel) often builds off of the previous story. So the story I'm currently writing often inspires the next. This isn't so with my short stories, but they're tied in to my serials too, so...maybe it is so? *blush*

Anyway, I like to just think about my stories for a while before writing them, and the longer the story, the longer the thinking period. I don't outline. I might journal about my ideas, but this is just because I like yakking about my writing since I have nothing better to think about. And I'll often think far in advance on the next story while working on the current story so I'll have to pretty much force myself not to start work on the next before the current one is finished! (I've noticed that I do this ALL THE TIME with series. It's kind of irritating, because it makes me think, "I can't wait until this is done so I can start the NEXT one!" when I'll just pull the same thing with the next, but it does give me plenty of time to gestate an idea.)

No, I don't know all the scenes and ideas and even characters ahead of time. I write it all as I go along, so there's lots of room for change and surprise. But I have a general idea of where I want the plot to go, and some basic scenes to start with, and ideas for later in the story and maybe for the ending; and as I write, more ideas come to mind. So your opening comment, "It's a lot easier to write when you know where a story is headed, but sometimes you need to just keep writing to figure out where it's going," kind of applies to me in both ways. I need to know the general direction a story is headed in, but since I don't know all the specifics, I just keep writing to see where it goes.

Regarding the specifics of how I develop my ideas over time, it varies. It's just such a natural process, like thinking, that I couldn't narrow it down to one specific method. Whatever my mind feels like doing at the time, I guess. Maybe I have a scene in mind, or a character's backstory, or just an emotion. Sometimes something I read or see somewhere inspires something. Who knows.

scheherazade said:

Do you like to know what will be your inciting incident, character goals, confrontations, and climax? Before starting, can you describe the concept as it would appear on a book jacket?

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Sometimes I know some of it, sometimes I don't. I can usually describe the concept, but as for how accurate the description will be once the story is done, I have no clue!

Sorry that I have no advice regarding your own situation. Writing is such a different process for everyone that what works for me might not apply to you. I've never had any trouble daydreaming.

I keep my mobile which has a voice recording feature by my bed so that when I come up with an idea 'out of the blue' I can record it. All my best ideas come to me when I'm asleep and I'm usually frustrated to find I've forgotten all about it whether it's a name, a dialogue piece or an idea for a story.

I generally get an idea for a character and go from there. I have three characters living in my head at the moment, and two of them have absolutely nothing to do with what I am working on right now

Oooo... interesting!

I'll occasionally (more than this actually) write before I have any clue where/who/what/how/why. No preconceived characters or ideas, etc, etc. It can help flush out the cobwebs, generate new ideas or just exercise your fingers.