Stephen King says that he gets the idea, a good idea where he's going, and he lets the "characters live". I can certainly view this approach as being exciting and romantic. I can also see the benefits. If you don't even know how the story's exactly going to turn out, it's going to be a lot harder for the reader to figure it out.

But Brooks has some good points. As he says, with an outline you can plot out your major (and minor) plot elements, so you don't have to come back and fix the errors later. You can keep a running track of what's supposed to happen and what you should stick away from. With a carefully planned outline, you can have a much easier time with the editing process because your plot AND (probably best of all)you should be sound to begin with. And (perhaps best of all) you always know what you're about to write, so it's easy to fend off writer's block.

An outline doesn't have to be set in stone, but it does give you a good roadmap to stick to. And even those times when you're feeling rather uninspired, you can still keep the story on track. I used an outline in my novel, and it kept it really tight.

I don't think the idea is set in stone either--

When going to Sea World do you wear sandals or athletic shoes?

Going to dinner--do you put the napkin in your lap, tuck it in your shirt collar, or leave it on the table?

Car keys--on a rack by the door or in your pocket?

Blow dry your hair or air dry?

Paper or plastic?

Cash or Charge?

It boils down to what works for you the writer.

I can't work with an outline--not at all. Once I've thought out the story it's done. I lose the magic and I do understand outlines are not set in stone. OUTLINES just do not work for me.

Another writers, many other writers don't get how I don't have big holes in the plot or how i know Tom should pick up the quarter for the pay toilet in chapter one to use in chapter ten.

They outline. And that's fine.

The real key to making your writing work--find what works for you and use it, no matter how others write.

If you write standing up, so what? I have seen plans for offices designed around people who work standing up. OK

YOU as the author have to do what works for you. Sit down and think on it--hmm I tired to write with an outline it didn't work, maybe I should just let the story play out as I go. Or I tried to let the story play out and i keep getting stalled or writing myself into a boring place, or I can't keep everything straight--then outline.

It is only about what works for you.

For me, as I have stated so often, an outline kills the story. The characters tell me the story as it goes. I do not even know them well, other than maybe a name, when i start--I don't know what they do for a living or what kind of food they like till I start the story and get to somewhere I need to know that info--then they tell me.

Others have to know all this before they start.

As a fast food chain says--have it your way--I add--who cares what works for others in the long run--

I've tried to outline: doesn't work.

I've tried to write without an outline: doesn't work.

What does seem to work is to start without an outline and go until I understand what the story is about, then I abandon that draft and start completely over with page one.

However, I don't believe an outline "inhibits" the creative process. I know King says that--and they probably inhibit his creative process--but they might work well for someone else. Fitzgerald had then entire plot of The Great Gatsby taped on the walls of his studio.

I have been finding my way as a writer for some time and I think I began to turn a corner after reading it. The advice that Brooks handed down, was further cemented by the Dave Wolverton workshop I attended recently. It was all about inventing, outlining, and timelines. Great stuff. It has helped me to focus my ideas and put them in some coherent fashion that I can understand.

I don't really want to say that beforehand I was writing willy-nilly, but it almost felt that way. Brooks and Wolverton gave me a straight path to walk down and I can now see my whole story, begining to end.

I didn't even ruin the excitement by telling myself the whole thing. There is enough still missing that I can have fun writing it. I used to think that if I let myself "in" on the entire plot, I would lose interest. I am finding that it just isn't the case with me anymore. I guess I am inherently lazy and a huge edit/rewrite isn't what I want to do.

That's fine . . . you don't like my post. You know, this message board isn't here to satisfy egos. Or maybe it is. I know for a fact that most of the people who come here are new to writing (at least professionally), and they have questions . . . they have concerns . . . they have, well, bad writing habits.

We can't all be pros right off the bat. We can't all ever be professional writers. But discouraging writing habits, techniques, and/or saying they're unimportant is not the way to behave. Especially for long-term posters. Why are there so many recurring threads? Why is base technique so often queried here? Why complain! People are here to exchange thoughts and ideas, not spend all of their time socializing. With that kind of attitude, why don't you go and spend your time at live journal. Or at least come up with a constructive post of your own.

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Anyone else? How do you write? Do outlines help with your process, or do they inhibit the creative movement?

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I gave you an answer to that as it applies to me (that is what you asked, how do you write?)--I didn't discourage others to use outlines, I said they didn't work for me. I said it was fine to outline-- And explained why not outlining works for me. My comment about these threads all ending up about outlines was an observation --seems there have been a lot of threads about outlines or others that turn into them. Just an observation--not discouragement or saying that other writers should be pros, or ego, or complaining.

And I agreed with you, saying that the idea wasn't set in stone either--to outline or not.

And where did I say your post or this thread were unimportant? Honestly, I don't understand your anger. And I don't think I spend time socializing much here at all.

I think you misread--I did not say that it was unimportant! Sheesh! BUT I will say the most important thing is to find the way YOU write. Your way--and that was what you asked about--how do you write?

Why you translated my answer into what you did I have no idea.

And the problem JB is that you posted your thread a day or two after after another thread took a tangent and became a rather detailed discussion about the pros and cons of outlining. It's a valid topic, to be sure, but your timing made it seem a bit redundant. That explains Shawn's opening sentence.

By the way, how's marketing the novel coming along?

I guess I just look at writing as a craft . . . a little more than I look at it as an artform.

Take painting, for instance. Sure, there are painters that created true wonders who were not technically proficient. There is much to be said for abstract ideas about light (that's all that is good about impressionism, I think). But I am much more inspired by Rembrandt than any of the other masters. Why? Because his paintings LOOK REAL! It is not just the "art" behind them, it is the TECHNICAL PROFICIENCY!!!!

Perhaps that's my problem. I truly apologize for upsetting you Shawn, I do, but when you reply first and deride my harmless post with seven analogies about why it doesn't matter, I take offense. I think sometimes on the internet people are a lot free'er with their opinions than they would be in real life. But there are people on the other end of the box. Your opinions are fine, well and good, but so are mine. And the opinions of the newcomer here are vastly more important than any of the regulars (for obvious reasons).

Outlining is an important topic, and it DOES matter. Maybe I just come from a traditionalist point of view, but it is an integral part of the craft. Yes, it is work, but it is also forethought. It is planning. It is craft. It doesn't have to take away from art. Sure, the notion that you can write a great book without outlining is romantic and all, but imagine the book you could write if you spent a little more forethought on a plot.

But MY book. Geez, I don't know. I could start another thread or two just about that. My agent is "talking" with Steve Saffel at Del Rey, and he is perpetually "about to read my manuscript". Diana Gill at EOS still has only read the first five chapters, and she "loved it", but she doesn't have the time to work on it. She has an editor in mind to review the book, but I haven't heard any word from her in awhile.

Honestly, I'm spent. I've been having perverse thoughts about PublishAmerica. Either that or any other number of small houses. I guess that's a LITTLE better than self-publishing.

Plus, there's still Warner and a few others. But it's been awhile, and my agent can't get ahold of them.

I say if you like to outline, start another and send it out too. Keep the fire burning.
Even if I work very hard, you are at the very least a year ahead of where I am at right now. That is providing that the stuff I am working on right now makes it into the hands of any agent or editor at all.

Don't be so down, think of all of the poor suckers that wish they were in your shoes right now. Be thankful for the leg-up and take it to the next level.

Man, Does that sound like a bad Tony Robbins speech? or what? Sorry.

But for her first reply to this thread, I was in total agreement with her attitude. We've had a few pure "to outline or not to outline" threads recently, without even a hint of new directions. I think that even if a very new member were to have posted this thread right at that time, my willingness to treat the question seriously would have been quite low.

As to terse--hmm, well, since all you read are the words you have no idea of my intention--terse or to put down is not one of them, or any part of them. Abrupt, that I will agree to--as I said I have little time to spend posting on this board or the other I go to.

JB--DO NOT GO WITH PUBLISHER AMERICA!!! I can give you few links that will make you see what they really are, AC Crispin and Victoria Strauss at Writers Beware can also give you an earful.

Also, JB--on the agent thing--let your agent do their job. DAW has had my ms since Sept of 2003, Berkley since Oct 2003, and TOR since March 2004. It takes time. I've gotten a lot of rejections--marketing killed it most times. At first things seem to move very fast--my agent sent out 34 or 35 quires, followed up, did more face to face and phone or e-mail--32 asked for more, either a partial or complete.

Rejections came fast at first, then we sat at 10 for ages. Then we got rejections that spoke of marketing and other things. Higher departments rejected it. And now we sit at 3 "big guys."

A friend of mine, James D. Macdonald has some good advice about how to handle the time involved, Tracy Hickman said something similar. Both say--there is no magic key, and it takes time, sometimes a lot of time--Jim is very fond of saying--forget the one your agent has out there--write the next book and don't think about it.

I agree, that's why you have an agent. So you can write and they can sell.

On PA, man you scared me to death with that thought. They overprice, none, I repeat none of their books are in real stores despite what they say--the real (brick and mortar) stores won't take them. And they offer no more than a spell check you could do at home as far as editing goes--please do not go with them. I would hate to see a talented writer swallowed up by them. They are a money making machine for themselves. A paperback for 21.00$ how many do you think you will sell? All marketing is up to you--ugh, I must stop. E-mail me and I will send you to the threads and BB's not moderated by PA. PA patrols their author boards and banns anyone who speaks against them--their own authors.

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Outlining is an important topic, and it DOES matter. Maybe I just come from a traditionalist point of view, but it is an integral part of the craft. Yes, it is work, but it is also forethought. It is planning. It is craft. It doesn't have to take away from art. Sure, the notion that you can write a great book without outlining is romantic and all, but imagine the book you could write if you spent a little more forethought on a plot.

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LOL--see that laughing, not rage not anger, not putting down.

I laugh, because a lack of outline is not art. It is another way of writing. There are other writers who also do not outline, King, James Ritchie, Anne Rice. I know the kind of book I write when I do outline--pure crap. Toilet paper, maybe. Bird cage paper, anyone?

My first novel was outlined--as per the instructions of many many teachers and professors--Where is your outline, Shawn, it was due this week? So I outlined. And I wrote crap.

And not outlining as way to avoid the work of writing--I must now clean the pop off my computer screen. Holy Cow--not outlining as a way to avoid work--she thinks, rolling the idea around like a coughed up glob of phlem. (note: meant to be funny--see me ROFLMAO--clearly if you think not outlining is a way to avoid work you have never really lived with a writer or been around a writer who writes this way.)

I have never said, nor will I ever say--that outlining is wrong. But I will say that it may not be right for everyone. As to plot, as I have said and as others who write by the fly say--the plot is there in a fly by novel just as strong as it is in an outlined novel.

If outlining is your way to do it, then by all means outline. But for me and some others it does not work and that has nothing to do with art--I have never even said writing was pure art.

The muses know, and have seen all my writing books, my grammar books--and i have suggested some very good how to books on the mechanics of the craft--that writing is hard work and if you don['t have the mechanics down even an outline will not save you.

This post is not aimed at JB or his words--but one note to JB--you are a pro now. You've joined the ranks of the pros. Not easy is it? And you see the one way that writing works for you--makes your story glow and got it accepted. YEAH, it is a great feeling and you want to share that with others because you want them to share in the feeling you had when an agent said YES.

But one way is not more right than another--and the outline not to outline one is a tough question. We can each only tell what worked for us. In your case outlining, in mine no outline. Both work. Plots are sound. Both ways got a book accepted into the ranks of the pros.

To be fair to those newcomers, don't we then need to present both ways as an option and not simply say, well, writing is mechanics get rid of the romantic ideas and your plot will be stronger? Not plotting is not romance--it is a dirven crazy way of writing, where you write so fast and in such long sessions your fingers are always curled as if over a keyboard.

Writing is work--newcomers need to know that. If they have the view of the writer in his smoking jacket sitting with a steaming cup and his keyboard they are nuts. It's a bleary eyed, lonely profession.

No matter how you do it--you have to find the one way that works for you. And both ways--outlinignn or not work--as I am sure King would tell you as he sits with his millions.

Shawn

Do you really want to deal with a company that lies in its FAQ?

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PublishAmerica is NOT in any way a POD, vanity press, or subsidy publisher, and has nothing in common with them.

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A pretty strange thing for a POD publisher to say.

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PublishAmerica is a traditional, royalty paying publisher. The term POD is losing meaning in the industry as ALL publishers use digital (Print On Demand) technology for printing, at least to some extent, and it is gaining ground all the time. With digital printing, books can be produced as the demand requires. ALL books printed digitally by ALL publishers, including those of all major publishing houses, are non-returnable.

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http://p197.ezboard.com/fabsolutewritefrm11.showMessageRange?topicID=209.topic&start=1&stop=20

40 some pages about PA.

Or from WI--terse is used in place of abrupt--as in a short quick reply to the point of rudness where abrupt is used in place of terse. A quick reply.

Shrug--accept dumbness with grace.