Hi, I have a 7-page plot outline. What do I do next to get a 50 page finished piece? Any ideas? Some extra information: It's an action-driven plot outline. Thanks.
So your question is: "How do I start my story?" There are many threads about that already, please look them up :] I'll answer anyways Once you have your plot set up, it shouldn't be that hard to start writing your story. I'm assuming it's a novella? why does it have to be 50 pages? Start writing your first scene. Just write it out. The first draft is never going to be perfect, you'll revise it later. Make sure you have a 'hook' or an 'attention-grabber' somewhere in your first chapter, preferably in the first scene. That should get you started. If you have any other questions, more specific ones, feel free to ask! :]
As was indicated above--you start writing. Once you have the first draft finished, expect that you'll have to edit and revise it. In other words don't expect it to be 100% perfect the first time through and don't expect to follow the plot outline 100% either. Good luck moving forward.
This verges on a bizarre question. However, I think I know what you mean. 1. You need to create characters. 2. The characters have to have a motivation that makes sense. It would be odd to have a 70 year old lady in a nursing home be your action star, because why and how! If your MC is a military guy, then his motivation may be "because I was ordered on the mission," but he can still have feeling about that in his mind. 3. In each of your chapters the characters have to do pausible things to achieve the goal of the chapter. When you do those things you can start writing. Personally, I enjoy the flow of writing and sometimes it takes me to new places in the story, and so I must adjust me chapter outline, but that's fun for me because it's creative. Did that help? Edit: I wrote some of that in the voice of Popeye apparently.
I have never had a first draft be a final draft. I am writing a novel, and am going over the first draft, I have re written the first chapter several times and still am not quite as happy with it as I would like to be. My point is, just start writing get it down and then you can go back and revise ( as said above )
Worry about character motivations, goals, obstacles, what your characters fear and are angered by most (these things can be obstacles) etc. Do NOT worry about things like character height/weight/favorite color/entire childhood history/birthmarks/etc. Lots of new writers seem to get stuck on this (those "profile sheets"), and all it will do is make you feel forced to shove in unneccessary details. Also, you definitely want to keep the plot quick-moving to engage readers, but don't make it go by TOO fast. As a journalist, it's easy for me to get hung up by just having a ton of action packed in on one page like it was an article instead of a fiction story -- while tweaking I have to go back and add more details. I write action-based, plot-driven stuff too, but you need to go slow enough that some suspense has room to grow. By "detail," I don't mean huge infodumps about what the setting looks like. This will bore readers, and the necessary info should be woven in naturally with a detail here and a detail there. What you want to spend some time on is tone-building. Use description methods, word choice etc to set the mood you want the story to have. Also, build up readers' suspense. Hope I helped!
