As I have said earlier, I want to post more of my thoughts and opinions about writing. One topic that comes up a lot and one that I have made a direct reversal in opinion has to do with writing while using an outline or writing the story ‘on the fly’ or as it comes to you.
In my first three novels, I used the ‘on the fly method’. I had the story idea and the general plot of the story in my mind as I wrote the stories, but I didn't know where the story was heading. It may sound like a set up for writers block, but it actually works for the most part. As you allow your mind to settle in deep into your story, it is amazing how the story can flow, telling itself, and how great ideas are spontaneously born. Then, mysteriously, the story comes together in the end, and as you look back, you are amazed at how well all the tangents flow back together to close the novel.
I was a fan of this method and preached that it was the best avenue for bringing the best out of the creative mind.
But that all changed when I wrote Byron Carmichael Book One. This book was to be a mystery novel; my first of this genre. I had big visions and a big story, and I set out just like before, diving right to my creative mind.
But my mental canvas became too big. I had too many characters that I wanted to develop. I had too large of a setting that I wanted to explore. I had too much story that I wanted to tell in just one novel. I reached nearly 450 typed pages when I realized that my story was too many, too large, and too much. I was nowhere near reaching the end of the story. I could not rein in all the wild tangents to close my story, and in a mystery, every tangent must lead you home; somehow.
So I scrapped it.
Come back in a few days and check out my thoughts on using the outline method and how it saved my story.
