InsaneJournal

drafting
Without realizing I was doing it, I seem to have arrived at a method for drafting novels. It isn't the same in all details; no two projects are alike; but the essentials are beginning to take shape.

I start out with disconnected scenes, whatever I can come up with, trying to use all the characters I've invented but not rushing if some don't give me scene ideas yet. Gradually, a plot shape begins to form in my mind, and I arrange the scenes roughly in order, keeping them all in a single file. Along the way, I make a list of scenes I'd like to include, that I think I need; I might also do an outline or synopsis, and make notes about characters of things that came to me but don't seem immediately relevant. In the draft file, I fill in missing material at different points, and if that missing material changes something in my original idea, I can easily find that spot and make the events/characterization/whatever match up. I don't insert the chapter breaks yet, though I'm beginning to have ideas of where they go. This is where I am on the current project.

If I follow a similar pattern to before, once I have a roughish draft, possibly with plot gaps, I'll break the file into separate chapter files, and then start filling in the remaining gaps, editing all the way. I'll probably print out the draft at various points, as it's easier for me to see some things on paper than on screen.

Once all the chapters I think I need are done, I print again, and do a paper edit. I enter those changes, and usually add a few more in the computer files. When it's in decent shape, I rejoin the chapters into a single file and print, and count it done. At least until I edit it some more.