I’ve been writing for about seven years now, most of that working closely with a writing coach. Over that time I’ve tried plotting and not plotting. Here are my thoughts.
Before I was a writer, I was also a photographer, and a potter friend asked me to photograph her work each year. And each year, I had an idea in my head of what the photo should look like. So I set it up and took the photo; we had plenty of time to spare, so after the obligatory photo was done, we decided to just play with different shots. Inevitably, we nixed the original photo, because the shots when we were playing were always better.
I’m not a fan of the term pantser; it sounds corny and mildly dismissive. I’ll call it plain old writing, with the minimum effective amount of outlining in order to hang the story together.
I don’t outline down to the level of beats to hit in what chapter/scene and who must do what prior to writing because by design it constrains what the characters can do to what they must do. I did that with the first edition of my first book (YA supernatural fantasy), and for me, that resulted in flat, predictable writing. Maybe others fare better than me at that; to each their own.
My outlines are the barest they can be in order to give my characters the maximum flexibility to do what their character would do in the given scenario. The outline of my current manuscript is 3 bullets: beginning, middle, end. If I get stuck writing a scene, I might do the same thing, simplify to 3 bullets to clarify for me what will happen.
I’ve heard minimal outlining cast as a boogeyman, instilling fear in a writer that they would lack the skill to discern if they have meandered or gotten lost in minutia and irrelevancy.
That’s not the advice I would give. I would remind the writer to be mindful of such things and that sometimes character development and richness happens outside of or adjacent to the plot while supporting the plot. I would remind the writer that they need to learn discernment, and they need not rely on a detailed outline or else are doomed to minutia.
If character freedom takes the story in a direction I hadn’t considered, does it improve the story? If it does, I leave it in; if it doesn’t, I take it out. Most of the richest moments in my books are moments that I couldn’t have possibly plotted out, and would not have happened had I plotted.
Plotting allows one to write quickly because they’ve planned everything in advance. Writing quickly, however, doesn’t necessarily lead to a rich, engaging, and satisfying read; nor does not plotting, but not plotting forces the writer to consider a variety of possibilities of what might happen next, which can lead to gems that plotting alone might not have uncovered. Plotting can shortcut the process of thinking; why think if it’s already been plotted out in advance?
So there are pros and cons to each. Neither is inherently superior, use what works for your writing.
FINALIST: NH Literary Awards, Outstanding Work of Young Adult Fiction
At the crossroads of supernatural and human potential, a mystical world exists in each of us. One anxious teen found it.
“A well-paced novel with tension and mystery throughout.” —Reedsy review.
