Laini Taylor gets me.
I decided before drafting the second novel in my series that I would first create a thorough outline of the plot. I embarked on my first book with nothing more than half a page of very disjointed notes scribbled on a napkin scrounged from a paper bag lunch. I decided that this time around I was going to do it “right.”
So instead of just jumping into the opening scene I began outlining…and outlining…and outlining. For three days I sat in front of a single page word document pulling my hair out as I attempted to claw ideas out of my head. What did I come up with you ask? Interestingly enough, mostly questions. Littered here and there in the white sea of a mostly empty document lay questions such as “What’s happening in her world when the book starts?” and “What is the conflict?”
Helpful? Not so much.
On the fourth day I said screw it, exited out of the document and opened a new one. I didn’t think. I didn’t wonder how what I was writing now would effect the end of the book. I just wrote. And a wonderful thing started to happen. The more I wrote the more the plot began to take form in my mind. As I filled the page with words the questions started to answer themselves. It’s a bizarre experience, really. Sometimes it feels as though the story is already in me and I just have to give myself the time to organize all the bits and pieces into a coherent whole.
That’s just how it works for some of us I guess. Some people spend weeks, even months planning out every little detail before they begin to write. But for some of us planning isn’t what breathes life into our books. Writing is.
Laini Taylor, author of The Daughter of Smoke and Bone series is an excellent example of someone who can write an incredibly compelling book with no plan at all. She’s also a goddess. If you haven’t read her trilogy, check it out.
Kassie Berg 