I'd agree with JB for myself and would advise it for the aspiring, but it's amazing the weird ways that some wonderful writers work. Anyone who's interested in such questions should check out the interviews of just about every terrific modern author ever (with a slight bias towards men and Americans) in The Paris Review - either the themed collections which are published I think by Harvill, or they've now got almost all of them online. One great writer (Eudora Welty?) just writes whichever scene in the whole book she fancies, in no particular order and pieces it all together like a jigsaw puzzle at the end.

If I find it I'll post the link.

Emma

Sure, there is no hard and fast rule, I just find planning stops me getting caught up in my own knots.

JB

The good thing about knots; there are so many of them. They can all be untied with a good twist of the imagination.

Ste

Me too. I think the key is to be alert to your own practice. If you know how it feels when a method works - that feeling of starting to roll along with your story - then if you try some different method - perhaps because it seems to work for someone else, or because you're writing in a different form or genre - you'll know how to tell if it's right for you.

Emma

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'Me too' as in agreeing with James, though Ste, I sort of agree. Knots are inevitable, and sometimes undoing them sends you off in a different direction, but sometimes it's just a pain.

Emma, I'd love to see that link. The French are great writers. I've got a quote from a French publisher that you might find interesting. I'll dig it out.

Ste

http://www.theparisreview.com/index.php

That's the home page. If you click on 'interviews' you can download anything from the archive - 50-odd years of it. Despite the title, The Paris Review did start in Paris, but is now based in ?New York, and has always been fundamentally American, although it's much more Eurocentric than that might make you think (I'll just fetch my flak-jacket after that remark).

Emma

This is that quote I was on about, from French publisher Marcel Duhamel:

"Get an idea. Start with action, somebody does something—a man reaches out a hand and opens a door, light shines in his eyes, a body lies on the floor, he turns, looks up and down the hall…Always action in detail. Make pictures. Like motion pictures. Always the scenes are visible. No stream of consciousness at all. We don’t give a damn who is thinking what—only what they are doing. Always doing something. From one scene to another. Don’t worry about it making sense. That’s for the end."

No planning there, me thinks.

Wonderful link! I'm just downloading a GEORGES SIMENON interview magnifique.

Ste

Pete, if you want something structured, you could try Writer’s Café. It has a feature called Storylines, which appears on your screen as a corkboard with coloured strings stretched across it. You hang little cards on the strings – they can be just brief notes or whole scenes, dates or times, it’s up to you. You have one string for each plot line, or for each character, or whatever, and you can shuffle them around to make sure you don’t leave any loose ends and your timelines match up.

It’s great fun. I played with it a lot but, in the end, I've reverted to the seat-of-the-pants method. I love that buzz when I suddenly see a link to something I wrote several chapters back, and it all starts to make sense.

Anyway, here’s a link to WC. I think you can download a try-out.

http://www.writerscafe.co.uk/features.htm#storylines

Dee

Nope, I don't get with that at all.

Why create problems when you don't need to? The knots can all be worked out in advance, making the writing process more pleasurable (as far as I'm concerned) - there is less chance of blocks, less frustration, and a much smoother finish. The editing process is also easier, and you don't get that horrible feeling of being lost in your own devices - untangling knots usually just make more knots.

JB

It's always good to hear an unbiased view, backed up with every conceivable thought. Each to their own.

Come on, Pete, create a new method entirely and knock our socks off!

Post-it-notes on a wall. Each scene is a note. Darts. It might just work.

Ste

I know some people actually write a novel backwards, but I can't see how I could manage that either. I'd end up in a mental ward, gibbering about prologues or something.

JB

It’s horses for courses, JB. I said somewhere else that I wish I could plan the way you do, but I've tried and it doesn’t work for me. The Winter House is a completely different story to the one I’d planned, and I believe it’s much better than it would have been had I stuck to the original plot.

Quite often, when I'm writing, a character will say something, or do something that I hadn’t anticipated. It just pops into my head and I write it down. That can lead me onto a previously unforeseen track which I can’t resist. Occasionally, but not very often, it comes to a dead end and I have to back track. More often than not it brings me to a different place, and I explore from there. Or it brings me back to where I started, but from a new angle.

It can be scary at times – but it’s very exciting.

Dee

Oh I'll go along with that for sure Dee. My map is only rough, and I'm free to take detours to get to the same place when inspiration strikes. Otherwise things are too rigid - so the map is only a guide, not a rulebook, so I guess I use both of these methods to achieve the desired result!

JB

Hi Pete,

Lester Dent wrote (got published) over a thousand pulp fiction stories. This is his master plot:

http://www.paper-dragon.com/1939/dent.html

Also, this is a basic mystery plot that may help you get going when stuck:

http://members.tripod.com/~ticket2write/mysplot.html


A while ago I did an outline for Elmore Leonard’s Rum Punch - broke it down chapter by chapter. I learnt a lot about how to structure a multi-pov story, I think it’s a good way to learn.

Hope this helps,

Dawn

Thanks evryone

Dawn, I'm interested that you did to Leonard what I'm planning to do to Rankin. In Rankin's case I think it'll be like unpicking needlepoint. A canny fellow indeed.

JB I like the sound of being able to write without getting stuck... that's the single most important thing for me right now.

Ste I think maybe the best ideas come out unconsciously, or ythe most 'real' stuff does, but that doesn't stop me getting stuck!!! Interesting idea about using darts Ste. Yes. Good.
By the way, that horse I ate, it's repeating on me.

Dee

The Winter House is a completely different story to the one I’d planned, and I believe it’s much better than it would have been had I stuck to the original plot.

Yes, I would worry about missing out on that factor.

In the end, maybe it's about how inspiration comes to you, at planning level or at writing level, or, preferably, both. I get VERY LITTLE inspiration at planning level and I regard this as a significant weakness which I must correct. I am autoflagellating with a mixed bunch of nettles and brambles.

Thanks for all the replies

Pete



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Ste - good to see you in Flash II. Next week's topic: 'Horsemeat'