Outline Catharsis

I worked a total of five hours today on the novel. Didn't write a single word in the manuscript, but did a major overhaul of the outline.

Now, I am clean, refreshed, purged... perhaps even ready for another lovely colonoscopy.

My outline had the first seven or eight chapters right on target... then the middle (about nine through fourteen) got way wiggy... then fifteen through twenty were either not represented at all or just globs of notes out of order, etc...

I'd reached a point where I wasn't using the outline anymore, and I felt like I was driving off the road. I was still writing, still staying on target with the plot, allowing myself freedom to stray from the outline, etc., which is good, but I was starting to lose a sense of how everything tied together... Here... you can relate as both a writer and a programmer... it was like having that big chunk of code checked out of the configuration management software, and the bitchy redhead CM manager is tapping a pencil at you in your cubicle, telling you you better get your shit checked back in and updated to the current development version.

So, I started this morning, first making some solid decisions about exactly where the rest of the story was going (and it's exciting, because I feel like I've reached that point... I'm in the home stretch... I still have a lot of little scenes to add here and there in the revision, but the major chapter chunks are there... the scenes carry the plot, and I just have to fill in some holes, spackle it up, and start sanding...) and then I went through both documents side by side - the manuscript right next to the outline (a word document in outline view so I can expand and collapse giant sections of text and not go fucking crazy, but I still do anyway... what I need is a monitor the size of a wall... that'll do it...)

I went back and forth between the outline and the manuscript, updating the outline with quick notes about the chapters... marking stuff in red that I needed to go back and add/fix/troubleshoot, etc...

I just finished... and tomorrow morning I will be starting chapter seventeen (of twenty). And I have a good, solid chunk of notes in place for how I'm currently thinking about the chapters, but... at the same time... I know it needs to remain a LIVE DOCUMENT, and I need to allow myself the flexibility to change it, let it fly, cut it, add to it, totally fucking ignore it, etc... I'm cool with that.

However, I'm far enough along with the story now that I'm pretty confident in the notes I have for these last four chapters. In fact, I've been thinking about the last three for months... I have them pretty much written out in my head (or at least acted out in a strange mental movie without sound or even dialogue, just characters moving around, emoting, wanting, conflicting, etc...)

So I'm pretty comfortable with where the rest of the story is going, and it feels great to be thinking that way... I'll probably be singing a different tune in a few days, but let me ride this for a while... while I can...

I'm learning, over time... to start with strong characters, a strong situation, and start nailing down an outline document with character notes, revision notes, to-do lists, etc... and then, most importantly, a chapter-by-chapter breakdown, with each chapter broken down into scenes if needed, so that there is some kind of framework... some sense of where the story goes next. If there are gaping holes, if scenes and chapters end up completely out of order, if characters show up who never existed, etc... that's no big deal.... it's okay because it's a live document... it'll never be checked back into configuration management... it's mine and it is a glowing, living thing... Every once in a while I have to clean it up, move the blocks around, get rid of the clutter and put the socks back in the drawers so I have got some semblance of order... so it makes better sense and morphs from a thinking and brainstorming document into a map, a set of instructions...

This is what works for me... I'm learning that, and that's the most important part... that it is what works for me... It's not a rigid document that I must follow... it's as alive as the story, but it still must exist.

So... with your most recent post... you sound a little bit like you're pulling your hair out... but you also sound like you're letting the current take you... stepping out in faith like Harrison Ford on that invisible bridge... that's okay... let it carry you. You told me you took a whole writing session recently to update and revise and retweak and rethink your outline... that's great too. I think we're both onto it... maybe it means a shitload of revision down the road... but maybe we just gotta get over that and dig in and do that revision when the time comes (and as you know, it's always ninety-times less work than we think it's going to be while we're procrastinating and not doing it...) So hang in there... hang in there... let it carry you, when you splash up against the river bank and you can comfortably hang onto a tree branch or something for a while, hook it under the corner of your arm and take some time to tweak the outline again... morph that freeform brainstorm craziness back into something that resembles a map a little bit more... but don't sweat it, don't force it... don't fix it until it breaks...

And remember, beyond everything, that A: We're in this together... there's someone at the other end of this screen who's right there next to you in the trenches, he's got your back, and he won't laugh at your bean sprouts (unless you're laughing too) and B: It's all part of the game... and it's a fun game when we sit back and look at it... it's not a job, it's our fucking lives, but it's a game all the same... It's a game, and we're on the same team, and we're fucking winning, dude... I can feel it in my bones... We're winning.

Love what you said about cheddar cheese blockage, inflated 'roids, blue fireworks... ya cracked me up good on that one.

And I already had dictionary.com saved on my link toolbar, but thanks to you I am now a card-carrying member of the word of the day club.

If anything, bud... just remember that we should be proud because we so fucking do not go gentle!!

High noon tomorrow?