Two Steps Forward

Hoping to skip any steps back… I finally had an epiphany yesterday that had me moving scenes around and adding new ones that made sense after the shuffle, and now there are fewer holes in my plot. I still have a gap that I am working to fill in, but it’s much smaller, and it’s just the one instead of three spots that really weren’t working. Definite progress!

I credit this jump forward to being able to see all of my scenes laid out in Storyline Creator (I’m really loving this tool!) and to this blog post from K. M. Weiland. I spent days reading over my scene descriptions and reading various articles and sections of writing books, and then the sun broke through the clouds and I could see my way. Hooray!

Wishing everyone a great writing week and breakthroughs where you need them!

Quick ROW80 Check-in

I’m still moseying along in my plotting for “Haunt.” I’m trying to work through things logically rather than getting hung up on setting and meeting a deadline right now. I keep having to remind myself that I’m trying to really learn these novel planning steps, though. I want to race! But that’s not the way to cement my understanding of how all of these steps work together. I have a few more scenes listed with their basic summary sentences, so there is progress.

I’m really enjoying working with Storyline Creator in this process. I like how easy it is to move back and forth between the sections so if I have a thought about a scene (mostly right now it’s “what needs to happen before this to make this make sense?”), I can just switch over to the notes section and write out my ideas and questions, and then shift right back to the scenes list. It’s very smooth, very simple, and it makes sense to me when I look at it. I’m very glad I found this.

I hope everyone’s stories are moving forward, slowly or otherwise. Happy writing!