Plotting

[osprey_archer]

I have been toying with the idea of trying to write a novel, again, because apparently I am a glutton for punishment and didn’t learn any lessons at all from the last four I tried to write. And I ought to add a fifth in there: Sage also, my magnum opus of last spring, collapsed in an ashen heap.

My kingdom for a plot!

Supposedly if you just keep writing a plot will appear unto you from the ether, and presumably this does in fact happen for a lot of people, but this has not ever worked out for me.

I wrote ~70,000 words last year in the novel about Sage, and I love Sage and her friends and their small town, the problem is that the story never exactly moves forward. It just kept expanding outward, in a sense: it became a melange of subplots, Sage and Her Relationships with Lots and Lots of People, Chiefly Her Friends But Also Her Parents, Her Sister, Her Favorite Teacher Who Doesn’t Like Her, Her Least Favorite Teacher, the Boy She Has a Hopeless Crush On, the Editor of the School Newspaper, and Sundry Others.

This is not a story. There is no way to bring this sort of thing to a satisfactory conclusion. I must become mistress of my subplots.

***

Fun fact: I have yet another idea for a fantasy novel about empire and colonialism and culture clashes and possibly theocracy, although no slavery this time, praise the Lord and pass the ammunition. And by yet another I mean like “ten more,” because apparently all my fantasy novels are about this. including the one about the princess imprisoned in the tower who brings to life an origami bird that eats a frickin’ forest and then, grown to monstrous size, comes back to break her out. Presumably it will eat the shingles off the roof, thus obviating the “So why is she imprisoned in a tower with a window large enough to jump through?” problem.

And then...and then what? I have the first scene written (why yes, this is a tragic plea for a reader); but I know from experience that if I don’t know where I’m going, I won’t get anywhere; and I don’t know where to go. I don’t want to plot a “And then Princess Arenyay bel Nessanen takes vengeance, VENGEANCE on her enemies” story.

Comments

[lycoris.livejournal.com]

Perhaps it's just a short story? Perhaps her getting free is the end of it, it's just the tale of her being trapped and then getting free thanks to the origami bird (which is a beautiful image and you could quite easily craft a whole short story out of that!) Perhaps the freedom is the important point and they just fly into the sunset and vanish softly and suddenly away.

*laughs* Looks like usually, too many plots appear for you but that can be okay - the idea of writing is you keep spilling them out and then prune like mad afterwards (I often tell myself this when I get to a bridging scene and just want to get to the next part - my bridging scenes regularly just become "FUCK IT THEN SOME TIME PASSED."

My only advice here (I feel a bit icky trying to give advice so do feel free to disregard it) is trying to work out what the journey is. The character starts somewhere, goes somewhere, either ends up somewhere else or back at the beginning. You don't need to know all the details of the journey (I never do when I start) but I always try to have an idea of "Here then there." Obviously, sometimes as you write, the "there" changes but it's always helped me anyway!

Good luck! :)

[osprey-archer.livejournal.com]

No, I'm pretty sure it's a novel. If she just makes the bird and it goes away and grows and then comes back and they fly away, there's not much conflict there - it's a boring story.