Tag Archives: plotting

Prying the Story Strands from the Ether

Posted on by
Reply

Sometimes in writing you strike a problem, like painting yourself into a corner, and sometimes it can be hard to find a way out of the problem I’ve written before about brainstorming and bouncing ideas of other people to see what works and what doesn’t. But this time nothing was sticking.

I’ve recently had this problem with my dark Angel story. I had started writing it, but had crunched to a halt, trying to work out where I wanted the story to go. I’d spent some sleepless nights trying to work out the problems, but unfortunately nothing was coming together. Brainstorming only seemed to complicate matters.

I decided I needed to work out what I had and where I wanted the story to go. I had a fair idea of the storyline, but it wasn’t flowing, it didn’t seem to be cohesive and the storyline kept falling part.

I had a piece of paper and I wrote down what I already had. I had about seven or eight chapters already written, but it kind of felt rushed. Like too much was happening in the first few scenes.

Then I worked out where I wanted the story to go. I knew where I wanted it to start, where I wanted it to head, and the climatic ending.

Then I filled in the gaps.

And it worked out! After working out a sentence or two for each part of the story structure I expanded it out until I had chapters. And this is where a character from the previous book needed to come back into this story, and with the addition of this one character, everything fell into place.

And it means that the chapters I’ve already written don’t have to be ditched. I only need to rework them to fit them back into my story structure.

I think the problem came from pantsing the story, and as I told you before, I am a plotter, and so not taking the time to plot out how I want the story to go was my problem. Unlike pantsers, I don’t feel like I’ve already done the story when I plot it out. I feel like it’s a guideline for me to work from. If I find a new direction to go in, I can, but I have the plotting there to come back to and weave the story together.

This angel story is going to be published under my other pen name, because it’s has more fantasy elements in it – in fact it’s all fantasy crossed with science fiction, but at this stage, I’m only concentrating on getting the story to come together.

I hope to have Quin and Stef and this story finished before the end of the year. Fingers crossed I can get it done.

Visual Writer

Posted on by
Reply

When writing, we often talk about pantsing or plotting, and now it’s starting to be recognised as a continuum, rather than one or the other. Which is kind of nice, because I don’t really fit in either camp. I do plot, yes, but I also only briefly outline my story, and allow the story to take me where it wants to go.

Which brought me to another interesting fact. Some people are visual thinkers and others are verbal. What I mean by that, is some people think with words, others think with pictures. It is just one of those things that makes us all different.

When I’m writing, the story will play out like a movie in my head. For an example, in my recent story, with Hope Hart and Thor, Thor was having an argument with another person (spoiler alert averted), and I could see them bickering back and forth, and my fingers honestly couldn’t keep up with the words that they were saying to each other. I felt like I was Hope, standing on the sidelines watching this bickering unfold before me.

I also dream in colour. I remember because the colours are so vivid, and I have woken up a couple of times with a deep red dress or gold ring on my mind. I also dream every night, although my psychologist told me that trying to remember and interpret my dreams was a form of overthinking – which is a negative thing. While I don’t try to interpret them anymore, sometimes a dream will disturb me enough to impact me through the day.

So, technically, I’m a plotting pantser, who see’s movies in her head when writing, and dreams in technicolour glory! Lol.

Some you Win, Some you Lose.

Posted on by
Reply

Sometimes things don’t work out as you expect. I’ve been participating in a 100 day writing challenge, which has been great. I love updating my status to confirm that I have actually been doing the work required, and I’ve only had two flex days, days where I haven’t done any writing at all.

I’m happy with that. But in the last week, I noticed that I was writing less and less on my Dragon Lore story. The reason? I was pantsing the story. I was making it up as I went along, which is okay, except I’m a plotter. I like to know where my story is going how it reaches its conclusion. With Dragon Lore, I wrote myself into a corner, and I couldn’t see any way out.

So, what do I do when I get in a situation like that? I stop writing. That’s right. I stop writing, because what is the point in writing a story that doesn’t make any sense and keeps going around and around.

But I haven’t stopped writing completely. While I have stopped on Dragon’s Lore, I started on my Contemporary Romance, Racing Harts sister, Faith. I even plotted it out on a Romancing the Beat Sheet, which was an interesting experience. While most of the time I plot I have an idea of where the story is going, Romancing the Beat is about the romance and the ‘beats’ are the parts of the story that make it a romance. While I like it, it isn’t totally how I plot, but I can see how it can be added into my usual plotting methods.

And I haven’t completely given up on Dragon’s Lore. I just feel that I need to step away from it for a bit, and then come back with fresh eyes to understand where I want the story to go and how to get it back into shape.

Have you had problems you’ve had to face this week? How have you resolved them?

Take care

Catherine

Phew!

Posted on by
Reply

Yesterday, I managed to spill some wine on my laptop, and I was scared as hell, that I had damaged it, but it seems I may have got away with it. It wasn’t a lot, and I immediately turned it upside down on a towel, then turned it off. The last thing, as a writer, I need is to lose my means of writing. Fortunately, everything is backed up, to the web and onto a hard drive as well, so I have everything, but its still scary. I’ve lost 30,000 words in a manuscript once, and that was hard enough. Remember people, always back up your information on your computer!

Other than that, I have spent some of this week reading up about breast cancer in preparation for my Carol’s Christmas story, and also done a little more planning and sorting out my Dragon series. I have copious notes and names and all sorts of things all coming together nicely.

I spent most of this weekend in my garden. I have a plan for what I would like to do, and I pruned back some hydrangeas, removed some agapanthus and pruned back a cypress tree. I’m shattered, but happily so, I am slowly accomplishing everything I wanted to do.

My mental health is doing okay. I normally don’t cope well over winter, but having Friday’s off, and having a plan for the year, has really helped me to keep going, and I have purpose over the winter period. Long may it continue. And having a plan for writing this year, has made the year really tick along. It isn’t flying, it is actually moving at a comfortable pace.