No plan survives contact with the enemy, but plans are really useful anyway.
The
thing is, my writing tends to be pretty organic. The conversations my
characters have aren’t manufactured through some formula. The path the
story takes? It’s not set in stone. I tend to outline just enough to
give me a path to follow, maybe some high points to hit, and then write.
The
outlines I write are more detailed at the start of the story, and less
so at the end — often having a single outline point like, “Hero saves
the world.” I mean, that’s enough: it says everything it needs to say.
Making
characters real means you need to allow them some flex in their
interactions. If you need John to get that cat out of the tree, but
it’s more fun or interesting to have the cat escape from him instead,
you’re kind of screwed if your whole story revolves around him returning
to Andy with the cat.
The better writing gets lost in service to the outline you’ve drafted, and that’s not okay.
Different
writers have different views on this, and I think that’s great. I’m
not trying to tell people that there’s only one way to tell a story —
I’m saying that when I write stories, I try and make sure there’s room
for my characters to grow through that story. After you’ve spent
100,000 words with someone, they’re a lot more real than they were on
page one, right?
When I wrote Night’s Favour,
the basic outline — hand drawn in blue pen — was on a page of my
notebook, and some supplementary pages for specific scenes. Writing Upgrade, a more complex story, I’ve needed to bust out Scapple to do a quick A4 on the moving parts. There’s lines everywhere.
Funny
thing is, both stories diverged from the originally planned ending.
It’s meant more work for me in terms of the writing, but it makes me
happier with the end result. I’d rather the end show a believable
outcome for my characters than keeping to an outline that was started
months — if not years — ago.
Outlines
are great, but like the rest of what I write, they’re disposable in
favour of the better story. To make things better, you sometimes need
to throw your initial thoughts into the trash.
Valentine’s
an ordinary guy with ordinary problems. His boss is an asshole. He’s an
alcoholic. And he’s getting that middle age spread just a bit too
early. One night — the one night he can’t remember — changes everything.
What happened at the popular downtown bar, The Elephant Blues? Why is
Biomne, the largest pharmaceutical company in the world, so interested
in him — and the virus he carries? How is he getting stronger, faster,
and more fit? And what’s the connection between Valentine and the
criminally insane Russian, Volk?
Buy Now @ Amazon
Genre – Action, Thriller, Urban Fantasy
Rating – R16
More details about the author
Website http://www.rage.net.nz
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