Destination: Unknown

[hjcallipygian]

I cannot write a story without first knowing how it will end.

This presents a fairly large problem, for I am not a resolution-first brainstormer by nature. The typical HJ story goes through an intricate and, quite frankly, ridiculous gestational period before it reaches a fully-formed state. The rough process is as follows:

1. Get an idea for a

Comments

[hjcallipygian]

Lots of similarities... I'm coming to it from a slightly different angle, and I'm keeping more of the chapter style of the first story intact rather than having more, shorter chapters. It just feels different, now that I know where I want to go with it. If that makes sense.

I'm also big on self-depricating melodrama, which most of this post is. =)

[keith5by5]

Planning's a bitch, no doubt about it. But without it you can get in a real mess, that's for sure.

1) I start with a sitch eg: 'What if Willow didn't bring Buffy back from the dead after Glory?' or 'What if Faith and Xander's one-night stand resulted in kids?'
2) Next comes a general plan, which usually details who's with who, who's thinking what, and any conflict that arises. If the heroes get into trouble, always have an out planned.
3) Next I organise this list into chapters.
4) Then I write it.

[hjcallipygian]

I just can't finish the list until I start writing something that won't fit into what I come up with for the list. It's like, I can't do it right until I do it wrong at least once, usually twice.

I have no idea why.

[masqthephlsphr]

I don't hate you, but I am amused. Not at you; at the writer's process in general. We all have different processes, and if anyone tells you there's a single formula process we should *all* be using for the best final results, they know NOTHING about human psychology. Writing comes from our most creative, irrational, right-brained side. We try to tame the process with rational thought, formulas, tricks, but although a little of that helps, too much of it actually makes the story worse.

I can't write a word if I know how it's going to end. That takes all the fun out of it. The discovery of a character ('cause it's always the character that comes first for me), who they are, and what they do, is gradual, for me. I have, for example, no idea how The Destroyer will end. I'm getting plot bunnies for late season episodes, but I don't know how they'll end up.

[hjcallipygian]

Heh. We've actually talked about this before, how we're like polar opposites when it comes to writing. Whenever I write one of these type entries, I always think of you and how you can't write when you know the ending, and how we would never be able to work together on a writing project for fear of the universe imploding.

[masqthephlsphr]

Well, when I'm working on a particular TD episode, I *do* know how it will end and I have it outlined--although just enough to know the basic sequence of events. But the events of the episode would have been churning and changing in my head for a long while before that ep came up next to the plate, and those events would have had their original genesis in just a few lines of dialogue that popped in my head several months earlier.

For example, the whole kidnapping Connor episode(s) came about because there was one single line of Drusilla's I wanted her to say to Connor. Eventually, I realized she had to be able to say that line without either of them killing each other immediately afterwards. Hence the kidnapping. The rest of the episode(s) gradually unfolded bit by bit and piece by piece in mind as inspiration struck. I have to wait for the idea to come to me, rather than try to force it. Otherwise, it sucks.

[xmirax]

heh. I do the exact same thing. Drives me absolutely nuts. But sometimes I can't figure out where exactly a fic wants to go until I start writing it, so I guess it all balances out somewhere.

[hjcallipygian]

Sometimes I have an idea where I want the fic to go, and then that gets derailed by a much better idea, so I have to start over again. Frustrating! Grr, Arg indeed.

[hjcallipygian]

I love you, man. [You're not getting any of my Bud Light.]

I love your icon, by the way.

I don't know why my fic process is that way, but it always is. I have several stories which I can't think of where they're going to go, and I know that I never will until I start to write them, and then I'll come up with something that will necessitate changing the start. It's frustrating.