Outlining for non-outliners, and why the right font matters
I don't outline. I can't outline, and I hate outlining. So why do I want to talk about outlining? Easy. I've written myself into a corner.
I did something a writer like me should not attempt: I created a portion-and-outline for something that was insufficiently written.
I already had much of the story, I knew where it would go, and I thought 'there can't be much harm in this.'
Well... there was. I'm now sitting on a story that is 'already written' - at least in part, and one that makes it difficult for me to dive into the character dynamics of the beginning because I always think of them as they are near the end.
(This is as much a problem of outlining as of writing out of sequence, in all honesty.)
Some people _really_ should not attempt to outline.
But now that I have, I thought I'd attempt to share the methods I am employing in the hope that they'll be of help to someone - or even just to me the next time I get stuck with a book and try to find something else to do with it.
Enter the Browne Diagram. It's a 'Browne Diagram' because N.M. Browne - yes, _that_ brownnicky first introduced a whole bunch of rasfc'ers to it, and I haven't seen this method of plotting anywhere else, so credit where credit is due!
Stone Priests
Originally uploaded by Valendon.
A 'chapter three, in which Sironek meets a being half-boy, half tree on top of a tower and he and Fenneth get to know him' type of outline really *is* deadly for me. A cell in a spreadsheet titled 'meeting Hrrlf' _isn't_. It's much better for me to keep the details - as far as I know them - in my mind than to write them down without dramatising them. And in order to get the 'showing' rather than the 'telling' I need to give the characters free hand. But seeing that I already have a goodly chunk of plot mapped out, I thought I'd put down the plotpoints I know in Excel and see how they'd map out.
The figures I've assigned them - other than the first few segments - are pulled out of thin air. All those neat even little segments simply say '1000' in my spreadsheet, that being an adequate chunk of text. Major plotpoints and the really important (though as yet totally obscure) sequence where they are battling Sironek's nightmares inside the reality that brought them forth were simply assigned larger chunks - 5 and 10K respectively. The rest is the happy return of two of them - Hrrlf appears lost, then they realise they've been tricked, and they need to go off and do something they failed at earlier so they can find him.
At the moment, the arc seems somewhat off - I start with a major obstacle (Sironek's nightmares), go through several potential solutions until they settle on 'we must carry the fight to the monsters' and make two attempts on *that* - they win, _and then there comes a whole tail of things that winds up a different story question, namely how Hrrlf can fit into human society_. And obviously, juggling both will need some writerly skill, but I shall worry about that later. (My backbrain is good at working things out. So there.)
What this diagram has done for me was to enable me that
- I've now started in the right place. (First time round was a bit fraught, I started at the third segment.)
- My gut feeling that I had progressed the relationship between Fenneth, Sironek and Hrrlf too quickly was borne out. By reordering chapters - first he does a non-comittal stunt as a guide, then they almost get caught being where they shouldn't be, Sironek and Hrrlf bond, THEN (next block) Hrrlf softens and the friendship deepends. Now it becomes a logical progression.
And to round it off I can keep track of my plot threads, note ideas where the story might go, and write down plotpoints - all without the feeling that I've written it before. Doing it in this manner - with the limitations Excel puts on text - means that I need to keep it in my head, with only the odd keyword to jog my memory.
If I'm honest, though, this diagram is just another way of reassuring myself that I am making progress, and when I'm stuck, that's more than welcome. Not only can you attempt to grasp the plot as a whole - with subplots, if desired - and see how it progresses, something I definitely can't do without the help of a circular diagram - but you can track your own progress - got lots of ideas for this bit, that one over there is still thin on the ground.
The downside is that all the segments I've devised only add up to 64K, but then, I am *very* vague about what happens in the middle, and I am confident that once I give my characters their heads, they'll surprise me.
Ready for another trick?
Most of my characters are pretty ambivalent about their stories. Valendon was fine about Palatino as body text, but insisted on Kunibert for the headlines; and it had to be a darkish blue. Progress was halting until I found the mode - and then his diary proceeded in leaps and bounces.
Altenglisch_MF
Originally uploaded by Valendon. Hrrlf - half boy, half tree, all teenager - seems to prefer this font...
Hrrlf, now, Hrrlf likes a font that has quickly become a favorite of mine, a font by the name of Altenglisch which can (and should!) be downloaded it from http://www.searchfreefonts.com.
I am *totally in love* with this font. I haven't seen anything quite like it, and I've looked a *a lot* of fonts, and ever since I started creating my Fontastico database, I've looked at a lot of fonts close up and in great detail. I'd love to set the whole book in it, which of course won't happen, but it's a wonderful font to write in; it puts me in exactly the mood Hrrlf needs, something that Courier is not capable of.
You can see why, I hope.
Kunibert
Originally uploaded by Valendon. Different fonts can help to get into the mood for writing different things.
Kunibert (Greenstreet) is one of my favorite fonts every _anyway_, and Valendon likes it. I'm not certain why he insists on dark blue, though.
Last but not least, I've found a giant advantage of writing average-sized books. I've currently got about 15000 words in my first draft, words that I am reasonably happy about, or at least happy that they're in the right neighbourhood. I've got another 7500 words that I will fold in somehow, although 4K of them are right at the end of the book. Together, that's around 22K. And 22K of an aimed-for 90K is, give or take, a quarter. And suddenly, knowing I have a quarter of the draft means that I'm far more confident about finishing it, and finishing it in a timely fashion, because see how much I've already got? 22K of a 300K trilogy is nothing. A drop in the ocean. 15K into a 90K book - even if it turns out to be a 100K or 110K book in the end - is the point where the middle should begin, and I check my diagram compulsively. Do I have my conflicts set up? I believe I do. Next scene will intensify the main problem - Sironek's nightmares - and after that, we'll have some fun and complications.
This draft may not be as good as the draft of The Dreamer's Friend was, but it's moving in the right direction. Hoping that every book will write itself as easily as the last one did is not realistic, right?
I did something a writer like me should not attempt: I created a portion-and-outline for something that was insufficiently written.
I already had much of the story, I knew where it would go, and I thought 'there can't be much harm in this.'
Well... there was. I'm now sitting on a story that is 'already written' - at least in part, and one that makes it difficult for me to dive into the character dynamics of the beginning because I always think of them as they are near the end.
(This is as much a problem of outlining as of writing out of sequence, in all honesty.)
Some people _really_ should not attempt to outline.
But now that I have, I thought I'd attempt to share the methods I am employing in the hope that they'll be of help to someone - or even just to me the next time I get stuck with a book and try to find something else to do with it.
Enter the Browne Diagram. It's a 'Browne Diagram' because N.M. Browne - yes, _that_ brownnicky first introduced a whole bunch of rasfc'ers to it, and I haven't seen this method of plotting anywhere else, so credit where credit is due!
Stone Priests
Originally uploaded by Valendon.
A 'chapter three, in which Sironek meets a being half-boy, half tree on top of a tower and he and Fenneth get to know him' type of outline really *is* deadly for me. A cell in a spreadsheet titled 'meeting Hrrlf' _isn't_. It's much better for me to keep the details - as far as I know them - in my mind than to write them down without dramatising them. And in order to get the 'showing' rather than the 'telling' I need to give the characters free hand. But seeing that I already have a goodly chunk of plot mapped out, I thought I'd put down the plotpoints I know in Excel and see how they'd map out.
The figures I've assigned them - other than the first few segments - are pulled out of thin air. All those neat even little segments simply say '1000' in my spreadsheet, that being an adequate chunk of text. Major plotpoints and the really important (though as yet totally obscure) sequence where they are battling Sironek's nightmares inside the reality that brought them forth were simply assigned larger chunks - 5 and 10K respectively. The rest is the happy return of two of them - Hrrlf appears lost, then they realise they've been tricked, and they need to go off and do something they failed at earlier so they can find him.
At the moment, the arc seems somewhat off - I start with a major obstacle (Sironek's nightmares), go through several potential solutions until they settle on 'we must carry the fight to the monsters' and make two attempts on *that* - they win, _and then there comes a whole tail of things that winds up a different story question, namely how Hrrlf can fit into human society_. And obviously, juggling both will need some writerly skill, but I shall worry about that later. (My backbrain is good at working things out. So there.)
What this diagram has done for me was to enable me that
- I've now started in the right place. (First time round was a bit fraught, I started at the third segment.)
- My gut feeling that I had progressed the relationship between Fenneth, Sironek and Hrrlf too quickly was borne out. By reordering chapters - first he does a non-comittal stunt as a guide, then they almost get caught being where they shouldn't be, Sironek and Hrrlf bond, THEN (next block) Hrrlf softens and the friendship deepends. Now it becomes a logical progression.
And to round it off I can keep track of my plot threads, note ideas where the story might go, and write down plotpoints - all without the feeling that I've written it before. Doing it in this manner - with the limitations Excel puts on text - means that I need to keep it in my head, with only the odd keyword to jog my memory.
If I'm honest, though, this diagram is just another way of reassuring myself that I am making progress, and when I'm stuck, that's more than welcome. Not only can you attempt to grasp the plot as a whole - with subplots, if desired - and see how it progresses, something I definitely can't do without the help of a circular diagram - but you can track your own progress - got lots of ideas for this bit, that one over there is still thin on the ground.
The downside is that all the segments I've devised only add up to 64K, but then, I am *very* vague about what happens in the middle, and I am confident that once I give my characters their heads, they'll surprise me.
Ready for another trick?
Most of my characters are pretty ambivalent about their stories. Valendon was fine about Palatino as body text, but insisted on Kunibert for the headlines; and it had to be a darkish blue. Progress was halting until I found the mode - and then his diary proceeded in leaps and bounces.
Altenglisch_MF
Originally uploaded by Valendon. Hrrlf - half boy, half tree, all teenager - seems to prefer this font...
Hrrlf, now, Hrrlf likes a font that has quickly become a favorite of mine, a font by the name of Altenglisch which can (and should!) be downloaded it from http://www.searchfreefonts.com.
I am *totally in love* with this font. I haven't seen anything quite like it, and I've looked a *a lot* of fonts, and ever since I started creating my Fontastico database, I've looked at a lot of fonts close up and in great detail. I'd love to set the whole book in it, which of course won't happen, but it's a wonderful font to write in; it puts me in exactly the mood Hrrlf needs, something that Courier is not capable of.
You can see why, I hope.
Kunibert
Originally uploaded by Valendon. Different fonts can help to get into the mood for writing different things.
Kunibert (Greenstreet) is one of my favorite fonts every _anyway_, and Valendon likes it. I'm not certain why he insists on dark blue, though.
Last but not least, I've found a giant advantage of writing average-sized books. I've currently got about 15000 words in my first draft, words that I am reasonably happy about, or at least happy that they're in the right neighbourhood. I've got another 7500 words that I will fold in somehow, although 4K of them are right at the end of the book. Together, that's around 22K. And 22K of an aimed-for 90K is, give or take, a quarter. And suddenly, knowing I have a quarter of the draft means that I'm far more confident about finishing it, and finishing it in a timely fashion, because see how much I've already got? 22K of a 300K trilogy is nothing. A drop in the ocean. 15K into a 90K book - even if it turns out to be a 100K or 110K book in the end - is the point where the middle should begin, and I check my diagram compulsively. Do I have my conflicts set up? I believe I do. Next scene will intensify the main problem - Sironek's nightmares - and after that, we'll have some fun and complications.
This draft may not be as good as the draft of The Dreamer's Friend was, but it's moving in the right direction. Hoping that every book will write itself as easily as the last one did is not realistic, right?