Writers Life

Welcome back to my recently created writer's blog, continuing my semi-weekly update on writing. After two weeks, I have still not heard back about the novel I submitted to the publisher. My first thought was this could be a bad thing. However, a quick Google search revealed it could take several weeks to hear back, which is not potentially bad because if the publisher was not interested, they might have responded right away, letting me know. In the meantime, I continue to beat myself up about small details of the book. Issues in the grand scheme of things, these issues are probably not big deals, but I resigned myself to live with them after my 8th edit. I was probably never going to be satisfied no matter how many more times I edited the book. (No, I still won't say what the book is about or the potential title.) Currently, I am starting my first revision of my second unpublished book and writing my new book, in addition to working 40 hours a week and home life. So yes, I am swamped.

This week I wanted to touch on plot development for writing. For the book I recently submitted for publishing, I began writing it in 1996. Twenty-five years ago, I created the concept for the story based on a simple, frequently used premise..." there is an accident in a remote area." The idea grew and developed over time. I would then come up with additional ideas and include them in the story. The original concept, which brought me to the story, had grown to areas not imagined when I began that first chapter.

During my plot construction, I prefer to use an outline. Reading up on plot outlines on Google searches, I found most authors choose not to use outlines because they feel constricted. But, outlines help me put ideas to paper. I do deviate from the proposed outline. For example, in the story I am currently writing now, a secondary character has instigated others into committing destructive behaviors. This instigated behavior was an unplotted concept in the outline. Because it's a horror story, I can't wait to see how this ends for this character. (No, I really don't know yet what happens to him.)

Although I try and stay on the story outline's structure, I prefer to go down the rabbit hole and see where conversations or new ideas take me. I can always change them or cut them as needed. Based on where these story changes or new developments take me, I update my story outline accordingly, cutting and adding the outline as necessary. I don't want to be so ridged to evaporate all creativity in my story.

An excellent example of this is the bad guy in my awaiting publication story. Initially, to me, the bad guy in the story felt like he was a secondary character. However, once I finished the novel, in my personal opinion, he had grown to be almost the main character. This bad guy has grown on me so much that I have thought he could appear in his own stand-alone story.

This character's development in the novel was not plotted in the story outline when I drew it up. But this character's development had become an essential asset to the story. I use the analogy of Alan Rickman's character Hans Gruber, in the movie Die Hard. The film Die Hard isn't as entertaining without Rickman's character's aspects. The banter, how Hans Gruber's always one step ahead of the police, and his narcissistic personality make him on many levels a more multi-dimensional character than Bruce Willis.

So, to sum up... Don't be afraid to use plot outlines to get your story down. Don't feel constricted by plot outlines. Sometimes story ideas take years to develop and end differently from how you originally conceived the plot or story. Characters can take a life of their own when they deviate from the outline and make the story more interesting for both the reader and the writer.

If there is any writing topic you want me to address or write about for the next blog, please feel free to comment in the remarks below.

Until next time