How do you write?

Once again, I'm going to try and start a conversation to help us all share advice and try to grow as writers. So with that in mind, here's the question:

How do you write?

Do you plan the whole story in advance, and know where it's going before you begin, or do you just have a vague idea of what you want to write? Or do you not even have that much, and just sit down to write and let it flow on to the page? Do you make a list of plot points or even a formal outline in advance? Do you write the story in the same order it appears on the page, or do you do things like write the ending first, if you already know how you want it to end?

Personally, I've only written 4 stories so far, along with the beginnings of several more, so I don't have a definite routine yet, but I've noticed certain trends. First, I come up with an idea, which usually starts as just an overall theme along with ideas of who the one or two main characters are. For a couple of my story ideas, this is where I started writing, and most of those are the ones I never finished, because I don't really know where they're going.

The one exception to that is my story for workshop 2.5. That's the one where I had an idea for an image and tried to just sit down and write, and ended up posting a thread here trying to refine that one image. I didn't even have a plot yet at that point. I looked at the workshop theme and realized I could make it fit, and went from there to my normal writing method, which is thinking about what the major plot points will be, and how it's going to end. For most of my completed stories, I've ended up making lists of plot points, and writing notes about specific details I want to be sure to include when I reach certain points.

One thing that I almost always do, which I think is different from most other writers, is that I write out of order. My first story was fairly long at 9 chapters, plus a prologue and epilogue. I wrote the prologue and first chapter at roughly the same time. Knowing how I wanted the story to end, I then wrote chapter 2 and the epilogue at roughly the same time. I ended up writing chapters 3 through 5 in order, while starting on chapters 7 through 9 at the same time. I ended up writing parts of chapter 8 after the beginning and ending of chapter 9, then the middle of chapter 9, and then I think chapter 6 came last. I knew certain events I wanted to include, so I wrote them first, then I first had to work out how to transition between them. And certain other things came up along the way, like the idea for chapter 4, which pretty much wrote itself with no planning, thus causing a bigger break between chapters 3 and 5 than I had originally intended.

I'm going even more extreme with my current writing project. It's a long story that I started writing, then realized that I needed to rethink it. I changed around the whole order and style of what I was doing with it, scrapping most of the 2000 words I'd already written and coming up with a formal outline to work from. The outline lists 11 chapters as roman numeral points in the outline, with A through D or more under all but one of them, plus sub-points under many of those. The scariest part is that I did an MS Word count on the words of my outline, and it's longer than any of my last 3 completed stories. Granted, they were short stories, but that's still one REALLY long outline (over 1800 words).

After finishing the outline, I wrote chapter 10 first, because that was the easy one. Oddly, the transitions seem easier for this one than the detailed events, probably because I've got such a detailed outline in advance, instead of just making it up as I go. This time, I have chapter numbers in advance, because they correspond to the roman numerals in my outline. Now I'm writing chapter 2. Chapter 1 requires some thought, so I'll get back to it.

So now that you all think I'm a total freak, how do the rest of you write? Am I the only one who writes out of order? Is my brain broken?

YAGS

I first come up with the personas, then how the super fem will get her powers and last the general world setting. After this I plan seven major chapters, then I plan several major points in the first chapter and I begin writing. I wait until I am finished with each chapter to plan another seven major points. However, none of these points are set in stone, if for some reason my original plans seems illogical I’ll change it.

My characters don’t always behave the way I planned.

Insipiration strikes me pretty much weekly. Sometimes they're a new plot twist, but more often they're just a visual 'sound byte', sometimes two, and usually unrelated. I've got one in my head now and it's just a super chick shoulder checking through a skyscraper wall half way up, debris flying everywhere, in some kind of high-speed urban gunfight with a super dude, old west style--but through a modern metro area. Then another clip of her lurking in a trenchcoat through a crowded sidewalk, trying to loose him in an urban mass of people.

From there I have to sit and think out the 'why'. Usually goes something like: um.....well, ok. There could be this government pseudo-organization that does all the shady US dirty work, but since super powered people have shown up (all levels), they've been quietly handling the problem, keeping things under control even without powers by playing one super against another.

Now I'm seeing a dark warehouse meeting with her in a trenchcoat across a folding table with three g-men discussing some phony reason why they think Superman's gone bad and needs to be taken out. "I'll need Kryptonite" she says (not entirely a good girl herself). "But of course." He smirks. "Would you like mustard with that?" Woo! Ok, ok, now I"m getting a hot blacksmith shop scene with her sweating nearly naked (nearly?) over a hot anvil with a hammer, struggling to use all her fading powers to forge kryptonite weapons and lead-lined bikinis and such for herself. That stuff makes for great money shots, so it'll probably soak up half the story (or more).

Then its off to the gunfight. Of course he's brought his own kryptonite-loaded 6-shooter n' hunting knife. Kryptonians aren't mind readers. It'll take 'em a good, long, sexy, city-leveling shootout to realize they've been duped by the same pack of g-men.

What happens next? Who the frak cares!?! By then we've all had our knob-throbbing fun out of the story--and that's really the whole point. Nobody cares about story resolution in Baywatch either. Check the title, Poindexter! It's all about watching the bays! "Slo-mo" is not a plot device. We should all use it more often.

Well, all of mine pretty much go like that: a bunch of glitzy "money shots" shoelaced together half-assedly, with a lot of knuckle-busting on the metaphor if I actually have to sit down and write it all out. Metaphor's a talent like leadslinging or pinstriping it seems. I've tried to teach too many people and failed, so I conclude you've gotta be born with it. Well, I suppose if nobody drove blandmobiles, the custom jobs wouldn't stand out so pretty either, so drive them Civics proudly (even if it's a Focus--they all look alike nowadaze). Its all in the name of urban beautification. I can't tell you what I drive. Its uniqueness would blow my cover.

And give us all more money shots. Too many comics clutter the store shelves these days published entirely without any money shots. What's a story here worth without "money shots"?

As much as the free shelf dust it comes with.

Write on.

Wuv,
-Whitepaw

happiest_in_shadows, your method strikes me as just a little odd. Why 7? Why not 6 or 8? Why count at all? And do you just work from one chapter to the next, without shooting for a specific ending? I usually like to plan where I'm going, before paving the road that leads there.

My method for coming up with ideas sounds pretty similar to WhitePaw. Something pops into my head for whatever reason. Sometimes, it's inspired by something I see, read, or hear somewhere, and sometimes it's just me. I write about a wider variety of "special" abilities than most people here, instead of just the old Kryptonian standards, so sometimes my idea is just an idea for a power, rather than a character or situation.

Then, as WhitePaw said, I ask myself "why?". I explore who my characters could be, what their motivation is, what would they might do with that power, how others around them would react, what else could result from it, etc. That's when the plot points and "money shots" pop into my head. Somehow, I suspect I have more plot points than WP, but I am cognizant of the "money shots". I just think having some plot can help build the anticipation leading up to those climactic moments, so to speak.

So I guess my method isn't all that dissimilar from WhitePaw, but I generally shoot for longer stories with more plot. In doing so, I feel the need to take notes along the way. I just can't always keep it completely organized in my brain. Writing a formal outline for the latest one seemed weird at first, but it seems to work for me, especially given the long length and non-linear style of this particular story.

Also, unlike WhitePaw, I don't have all those metaphorical gnats buzzing around all over the place. I may have a couple here and there, but not to the point of letting them swarm. I've been exploring the possibility of including more, but I haven't done much with it yet. After all, I am a novice writer.

YAGS

I use the number seven I suppose due to many years of religious training which has taught me seven is the number of perfection, though eight is important as well since it is the number of rebirth.

As I mentioned I plan seven major chapters and wait until I get to each chapter to plan seven major points in the chapter. So in a way I do know the direction I want the story to go. However what I’ve learned is that quite often my characters want the story to go a different direction then I want it to go and I am not willing to force the story to take a path that seems unnatural.

I plan my characters’ personas before hand and I try my best to stick to how that persona would behave. Inevitably it turns out something I had originally planned doesn’t agree with that character’s persona. This means I either have to go back and change the character’s persona then adjust the entire story to fit it or I can just change my future plans. The future is much easier to change then the past.

How do I write? Beats me.

I usually just start off with a story idea, which gets me through the first two chapters or so. Then things just acrete from there.

In my first story, the original version of "Julie," I started off with "What if an Arion Beta got stranded on Earth? One who was pregnant with a child of a Prime?" It was intended as a short story depicting her teen years. Two revisions including a change of hair color, and thirty chapters later, she's still going strong (no pun intended). And yes, there's a lot more coming.

Pretty much the same with my other stories. I never expected Jessie or Denise to still be going after more than thirty chapters each. And when I started Marlen, I never expected the Beta Tyreen to take over the story as she's done.

A lot of it is inspired by the pics. I see a pic or a sequence of pics, write a scene, then try to work the scene into something resembling a plot. Enough of that, and I've got a chapter or two.

Ok ok ok, this is a good topic. Got me to thinking, deconstructing everything I've seen and such, trying to tinker toy it all together again.

I realize now that I've struck a theorem. White Paw’s Theorem of Cinematography Construction: the basic building block of any action movie is the ‘money shot’: a short, high-value scene of either action or sexual appeal. Money shots are in turn held together by the ‘plot’: anything that can be passed off as a ‘why’ the money shots are related. It is only the ratio of money shots to plot that determine what category a movie will be shelved as. Money shots dominate “Action” movies. Plot dominates “Drama”.

I can think of extremes of both action and drama genres. James Bond movies are solidly in the action camp, being composed as a series of action shots with a plot that makes little to no sense whatsoever—and nobody cares. Whatever it takes to set up the next outlandish car chase, the next racy bedroom scene—the more outlandish, the racier the better. The James Bond franchise has had decades of practicing this—and it shows. They started out slow, but they’re getting tighter into my action theorem as they go along. Hey, I know. Let’s drop a helicopter out the back of a burning cargo plane and ride it down! Cool! Why would anybody in their right mind be in a situation like that? Moot point—it just films so damn cool. Same w/ the whole “can’t film a train w/o a helicopter in the shot too” thing--preferably an exploding helicopter. Apparently trains are too lumbering plot-like, and they must be spiced up with a good money-absorbing helicopter.

You can come up with your own drama film example. I watch too few of them, and I’m betting you don’t watch many either (unless y’all have lady friends )

The first Matrix movie was one of the few middle-liners. The plot actually mattered for something in that one, despite the fact that it was filmed almost entirely on sheets of hundred dollar bills. But they couldn’t hold it for long. The second and third Matrix movie broke back down into my ‘nearly random jumble of money shots’ theorem-style action flicks: just a big pile of money dumped out on the table for ya.

LotR and Titanic are the two big, solid middle-liners I can think of. Pretty much the ONLY middle-liners I can think of. I think we can all agree that as big-budget special effects action flicks both tended to drag on and on and on—and one of them outright sank.

Yeah, I’m more an action flick fan. It shows in my writing. I’ve tried writing middle-liners, but mine sink too. So I’m staying solid action. All I’m asking is that you have a look at my works from my theorem’s viewpoint and judge them for what they truly are: the fine art of nearly random money shots. It’s not about how much sense they make. Its about how cool they film. Crafting diamond-sparkling money shots is no less an art than gluing together the drama side. Shakespeare had his trap doors too. And going is half the prattle.

At least my stuff and for me.

Write on.

Wuv,
-Whitepaw