Plotting

There seems to be an everlasting ... discourse on how people approach writing. Some fly completely by the seat of their pants with only the barest sketch of where the book is going to go -- or nothing but an idea. Some spend weeks writing a complete, detailed outline to guide them through the writing process. Some write linearly, everything in order, and some write whichever scenes their muses take them to in whichever order they happen to pop up.

I wonder if the people who swear by one particular approach have been doing it that way from day 1 or if they've grown into it over time. Because I don't have a particular method yet. Everything I write, I approach differently and my method is usually some mish-mash of everything.

There are times I start out with an outline. Then I get bored after I've reached chapter 4 (and mind you, my outline is the barest of bare: "opening scene is Sue being stalked through the cave by the mystery man. second scene is Greg in class.") and just start writing. With the book I just finished the rough draft of, I had no idea who the killer was or what their motivation might be until I was halfway through. And even once I had a killer, I changed it twice in the span of a week.

For my current book, though -- the one that was teasing me oh so much -- I had a pretty good idea of what was going on before I got started. I felt like I have an adequate grasp of the main character, at least. I knew the impetus for the novel and the underlying plot; I know what the protag is going to discover when she starts digging. I know who the supporting characters are -- bare-bones, at least -- and the basic roles they're going to play. I don't know the exact ending but I know where it's supposed to go. This is new for me.

I wonder if this will be my approach from now on. Perhaps limiting myself to planning a new book while I'm still writing a previous one will be good for my plotting and help me grasp my stories better before I start writing them.

So far, I'm sticking to the plan. But I'm only a couple chapters in and throwing all my plotting out the nearest window is definitely not outside the realm of possibility.

I'll keep you posted.