This chapter was basically an introduction. It didn't have a lot of meat to it. It's called, "Chapter 1: Should You Outline?" She spends most of the time talking about the pros and cons of outlining, and seemingly trying to convince the people who bought her book called, Outlining Your Novel: Map Your Way to Success, that they ought to give outlining a chance. I guess there's always an introductory chapter, but I would have preferred getting more meat right away.
She talked about the two camps in the writing world, the plotters and the pantsers. Plotters are the ones who plan out their book before they start to write it, pantsers are the ones who are flying by the seat of their pants, figuring it out as they go.
She says that, in general, they do about the same amount of writing, but at different places in the process. Plotters spend way more time before writing the first draft getting everything ready to go, and write a lot in that stage. Whereas the pantsers write a lot more in the second, third, and fourth drafts of their books, as they have to go back, and clean up all the dead ends that they meandered down, and seed in the foreshadowing and setup for the ideas that they came up with in the middle of writing the book.
Unlike others I've read books by, like Stephen King for example who says that using an outline is bad and no writer should do it, Weiland says that either way is fine, and it's up to each writer to figure out what works best for them.
I'm pretty certain that outlining benefits my writing significantly. Every time that I have an outline, the process goes much better for me. Most of my favorite stories that I've written have had outlines to follow when writing. The more in depth the outlines were, usually the better the story turned out. Also, I really hate the process of going back through a story and re-reading it after I've written it to see what characters are lacking, what plot points are unnecessary, where the plot holes are and so forth. I don't mind looking for typos, but I don't want to be seriously re-writing a story once I'm done with it. I just hate that. When I write the end, I want it to actually be the end. So, I guess outlines are for me, and I better get better at them for the future.
She talks about some of the misconceptions of outlining that are out there. Some think that outlines require formal formatting, and making an outline like the ones they taught us all back in elementary school sounds like the worst thing imaginable. Doesn't have to be that way, though. You can organize them any way you want. If you like the formal formatting then go for it. If you prefer notecards stuck on a bulletin board with strings tying them together like one of those conspiracy theorist's charts, then do that. Whatever floats your boat.
Some think that an outline limits creativity. Once you have that outline, things are set in stone, right? You can't change after that. Not so much. She uses the line from Pirates of the Caribbean to compare the outline to the Pirate's Code.
Stick to your outline as long as it is working, but if you come up with something great, then deviate. You can fix it like a pantser once your done, or go back to your outline and square it up with your new addition before going on. Whatever works for you.
Some people think that outlines rob the joy of discovery from the writing process. Many writers prefer writing out into the dark, and finding out what is in front of them one step at a time, but according to Weiland:
In many ways, an extensive outline is a first draft.
That's an interesting thought. Writing your outline is when you discover your story, but in a way that limits the amount of time wasted on writing fruitless meanderings. You discover your story as a skeleton. Then when you write your actual first draft, that's when you put the flesh, organs, muscle, skin, and hair on there, and it becomes an actual body. Instead of doing it like a pantser, where they make the whole body all at once, then have to go back and rearrange things because they forgot to give it a nose, the elbow doesn't bend, and it has three legs.
Some say that outlines take too much time, and I have to admit that this is one of the things that hinders me in my desire to outline. When I hear Weiland talk about spending three months on an outline for a novel, I think, "Holy crap, that's longer than it should take to write the whole novel, and probably it's sequel as well." This woman talks about writing one novel a year, which I think is a paradigm of the past, when self-publishing was not available to authors. Of course, what do I know? I've never published anything. I'm not writing books for a living. So, I might change my mind.
The fact that she spends little to no time at all on rewrites, however is a draw to me. It may take three months before I start, but it won't take three months to square things away once I'm done. I suppose I could also spend part of my time writing my book each day, and part of my time writing the outline to the next book, so that I could start writing on the next book the minute I finish the first one. And I could go straight into outlining the book after that at the same time as well. That could keep my productivity up, if I could manage that.
She said that outlining always helped prevent her from getting stuck in a story, and losing steam. Seems like a wise insurance policy to take out. Rish Outfield has complained to me many times about the sheer number of stories that he has started but never finished. I wonder how many of those would exist if he'd spent time outlining them before starting in on the first draft.
There's plenty of benefits of outlining. You can ensure that your story will have balance and cohesion. You can take a look at the whole story, and see where it might be lagging, what parts need to come sooner, what parts need to be jettisoned. You can make sure your ending will resonate before you've written 80,000 words to get to it. And if you have any issues, you can fix them before it becomes a monumental task.
Outlines prevent dead-end ideas. You know before you spend the time writing them that it's not worth the time, and therefore don't waste that time. This has nothing to do with outlining, but I remember an old Author's Note from Piers Anthony where he talked about how his writing career had improved as time had gone by, because he'd gotten to know his editors, and could pitch his ideas to them to see if they were interested in them or not. So, he wrote way less, but sold way more. This is kind of the same principle. Find out what doesn't work before you spend all the time writing it, only to have to kill that darling later.
Outlining makes it possible to provide foreshadowing. How can you say something like, “And they never saw Stu Redman again,” unless you know what is to come? Interestingly, that's a quote from The Stand by Stephen King, who insists he never uses outlines, so I guess he must have gone back and added that in afterwards. Seems like the less efficient way to go to me.
Weiland says:
As a pantser, when a startling plot twist occurs late in the book, you'll have to go back and sow your foreshadowing into earlier scenes. Not only is this extra work, it can often be difficult to make the new hints of what's yet to come flow effortlessly with your already constructed scenes.
I've noticed that in the past when I've tried to go back and improve a story that I've already finished. Scenes flow along logically and naturally. It's how we think and talk. So, trying to cut and splice something into the middle of that can be a total nightmare sometimes.
Outlining can also help to make sure your pacing is smooth, and indicate what character will be the optimal point of view. I remember complaining about how terrible the finale of that Twilight book by Stephenie Meyer was, because the point of view character was dying, and incoherent while all the final action was happening. She wasn't an active part of the events, she was a damsel in distress, but not even lucid enough to tell the story of how she was saved. It totally sucked. I wonder if Meyer outlined that book before starting or not.
She also talks about the advantages that it gives when it comes to maintaining a consistent character voice. Weiland says:
Because our perception and understanding of our characters often evolve over the course of the story, the result can be an uneven presentation of the character's voice.
That's an important thing to watch out for. When you know the full story, and you spend time crafting your character as part of the outlining process, you can make sure that you know your character well enough that they are the same person at the beginning as they are at the end (not counting their arc, of course).
Having an outline can also offer motivation and assurance. It's a pretty daunting task to write a 100,000 word novel. That's a lot of work. If you have any worries about your ability to make the story work, you might just give up rather than chance it. But, with an outline, you have the complete story right there in front of you. You know it'll hang together, because you already planned it so that it would. So, you can go ahead and put in the effort with confidence. Weiland says:
Outlines also motivate us to keep on writing through the tough spots, so we can get to the good stuff.
So, I guess I'm going to try to make this happen. She didn't really need to convince me, but she did all the same. Next time, is "Chapter 2: Before You Begin Your Outline." We'll see what I've got to do to get ready to get ready.
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