EVOLVING STORIES

Has it? The better question is: when hasn't it? I experience this with each novel I write! How I address it depends on how big the change is. Sometimes, all it needs is the addition of a new scene inserted, with peppering of details in other scenes for continuity. Other times, I've needed to scrap entire scenes. 90% of the time, I end up with a better product, but that remaining 10% is usually me overthinking something or an idea that would go better in a different story completely.

My motto is that the first idea is never going to be the end project. Heck, my first book, The Door in My Hand was barely the same story when it got to publishing stage. I can't remember who said it (maybe Rowling?) but an author quote I stick by is that "you'll end up rewriting every word of your work" (paraphrased).

This absolutely happens. When you outline, you're doing things very high-level. You might say "This scene will be Very Sad" but you don't get the actual type of sad until you're actually writing it. How you think about things at a high level is not the same as how you think about things when you're knee-deep in the cranberry bog/jungle/muck/whatever metaphor you want to use.

What I've done when that happens is that I make a note of it to make it consistent in editing. Such as "Their motivation is actually going to be [new thing], so delete that one scene" or "[bad guy] also did [another bad thing] so foreshadow that earlier." If I go back and change that stuff when I first have that idea, then I'm getting distracted and it's keeping me from finishing the first draft. I don't know if any of my changes were big enough on their own to throw out the whole draft, but over the 10 years I did the very first draft of my current WIP....there's been a lot of changes. So I just redid it all from scratch and pretended that first draft never existed. If I tried to rework the old words then I don't think it would turn out any good.

This is why I'm a pantser. My stories evolve so much as I write them that there's no point planning in advance. I've also frequently gone back and made major changes to what I've written so far. And I've rewritten entire stories from scratch to incorporate even more fundamental changes. I keep a backup of the original before I make drastic changes in case I hate it afterwards but I don't recall any occasion where the new version hasn't ended up being the better one. So it's definitely worth it.

If the new idea is better than the original - which includes scenes feeling more natural and in line with how the characters are as people, as opposed to forcing characters to do something to fit the plot even if it doesn't feel like what that character would do - go with it.

To add to the above, small plot holes usually aren't evident in my outlines but become evident as the story shapes up. Example: one of my protagonists doesn't--but should--enlist help from a powerful but very minor character (they have a close working relationship). This minor character wasn't on my radar as part of the main character's 'resources' when I first outlined. I saw the plot hole on this latest revision.

This and a few other holes and speed bumps will be addressed in draft 6.

As a second item, some necessary scenes don't have enough heft. They were in the original outline, it makes sense that these scenes are there (from a plot perspective), but they're weak. So, revisions happen, to bolster them in one way or another. This involves adding (or deleting) stuff, which nudges the story away from the outline.

And yes, to your questions, sometimes things get ripped out altogether. Or ripped entirely apart. The query for this project was written first, over a year ago, in an effort to have a hook-y skeleton to build from, and but my project ended up looking nothing like that query pitch. Whether this is a 'better' story or not would be a matter of opinion, I suppose.

Last thing, anecdotal: One of my neighbors was a writer for Nickelodeon and we went to a taping of one of their shows, years ago. It was remarkable to see the taping of the episode, and to see this group of three writers off to the side, working in real time to adjust the lines and beats for the different takes of the scenes.

Oh, boy, I'll say.

These days I try not to waste too much time on a detailed outline; instead I lay out the plot in a vaguer, looser fashion, but try to keep a firm vision of my ending in mind and what will be required to get me there.

Problems come when the original ending no longer fits with how the story has now evolved. Worse problems come when I cannot firm up the plot at all and the narrative keeps changing. There is never a solid platform upon which to build the next level of story to get within sniffing distance of the ending, whether as originally envisaged or not.

Everyone is different. I think you will have to work through your process and find what allows you to get the job done, even if that involves junking your outline a few thousand words into a new novel.

I had a character go totally off-outline which improved my plot immensely. And added five scenes and two chapters, which as an underwriter is a godsend.

And don't get me started on the things my editor had me add. The order of my scenes changed dramatically, and for the better.

13 drafts total went into my debut novel. And I'm not sorry lol.

This definitely happens to me al the time, though I take a bit of a different approach to it. I make a note of what changes I would need to make (possibly making a revised outline, for a big enough change), then keep writing as if I'd already made those changes. That way, I can actually get through the draft instead of pausing to rewrite half the book. Basically my first drafts are a mess of comments noting things I'll need to change for future consistency, but it's much easier to deal with it all at once in a rewrite or major edit than it is to keep going back to deal with every single change I want as it pops up. The exception is making a change that fundamentally changes the course of the book (Once I removed a POV character and that characters entire plotline, about 40 percent of the book, so I had to rework the remaining POV character/plot to be more complex and remove the bits that intersected with the other POV character). I've never regretted the changes; they invariably make it better, even if they're a pain in the rear. For a hard-core planner, I never seem to actually stick to the plan.

I've certainly scraped entire scenes or had to rewrite entire sections of the story to make it better. Rewriting is just part of being a writer as far as I concerned.