I was wondering how other people deal with the planning stages. I have a few different concepts and basic premises for projects I want to write, the problem is that when I try to expand on those ideas and turn them into a story I end up with a jumbled mess of plot points and conflicting ideas that can't possibly belong together. Does anyone have any tips for focusing ideas instead of letting your mind run wild or methods for planning and developing that have worked for you?
Sometimes the plots reveal themselves as you write, and that's a great feeling, but one you can't plan for. Maybe in your case you could use some of the disconnected plot points as a subplot with another character(s) and have it loosely connect that way. In many of my short stories, I don't start with a full plot, or at least not an ending (or how to connect the dots TO the ending) but then it appears during development. Everyone's process is different though and you can't count on that happening but sometimes, it's good to just start writing and see what comes out.
I always start with the main idea, or theme, first. What is it you want to say? Then the plot will unfold and flow from this. The way to organize/determine your plot is to identify the plot elements - i.e. the major events of the story. The six main elements of a plot are: Exposition Inciting Incident Rising Action or Progressive Complications Dilemma Climax Denouement To read more about plot and its elements, check out this webpage: What Is Plot? The 6 Elements of Plot and How to Use Them
I remind myself that my rough draft is a work in progress and therefore it's okay to be a jumbled mess of plot points and conflicting ideas that can't possibly belong together. You have to start somewhere and for me, it's much easier to start with something even if it's not that coherent than with nothing. So, for my rough draft, I'm letting my mind run wild. I just want to get everything out there. I don't want to leave any idea unexplored. I'm not caring about how I'm describing the setting or characters. And throughout this process, I'm taking notes. I use a program called yWriter. (It's basically the poor man's Scriver.) If I come up with an idea that contradicts something 3 chapters earlier, I'll go back to those chapter notes and notate that this is a contradiction. If I think about "You know, it might be better if I..." I'm going back to that scene and writing a note that says "Try this instead." I don't want to look for perfection in my rough draft because perfection is too limiting. It's hard to perfect when you don't know what it is you're trying to perfect. It's really in the next drafts afterward that I clean the story up and realize what seemed to be a good idea in my head, wasn't actually that good. I'm taking characters out or adding characters. I'm refining the motives and I'm settling on what their goals, motives and conflicts are.
For plotting I'm using software called Plottr (seems appropriate) with the included Snowflake template. I also just finished reading the Snowflake Method book, which is about plotting. Kind of a dumb name (snowflake), but it seems to be an excellent method so far. It's about developing your story ideas in stages, starting by just writing up one sentence to describe the entire story, and one sentence for each character's arc. Then you expand each single sentence into a paragraph, and later into a full page. It causes you to think it out in stages and develop it. You also fill out character sheets that include their motivations, values, goals, and their fears as well as the thing each one wants versus the thing they really need. All of this is really what story is about, and many methods leave some of it out. Another great factor of the Snowflake method is that you figure out the Disasters at the end of each act. As well as each character's scene goal for each scene. It's kind of a lot, but this way you don't leave out any of the important things that I used to always leave out. Now it feels like I really have a story shaping up, whereas in the past I tended to meander around without ever getting the actual storyline off the ground.
Thanks for the replies, everyone, much appreciated. I've tried the write first, think later method and it works well for me when writing screenplays but with fiction writing I get so lost that I often don't know what my story is. I haven't tried using note or annotations to mark things I want to change or where I could try one of the other ideas, I'll try it out. I've never heard of plottr before, I'll check it out. I've tried breaking down character wants vs needs but the snowflake method sounds like a good way to break down and expand on core ideas without getting too lost in thought. I only have a couple or characters that aren't very fleshed out for one idea I'm trying to work on which is a serialised horror that I'd describe as The X-Files meets The Shining with a touch of Twin Peaks. A new sheriff arrives in an isolated town after the old Sheriff vanishes. Plots range from slasher style serial killer, body snatcher/skinwalker style creatures, a cult trying to contain or unleash a Cthulhu style monster, an X-Files style secret agency, the town being built as a cover to hide the monster, a time anomaly that means crossing a barrier around the town leads you to a random point in time... I think you'll understand why trying to figure it out has become such a headache.
Check out this video on Plottr's youtube channel: How to Create a Series Story Arc Plottr can be used, as any plotting method or probably software can, to plan out a series arc as well as individual books. Kind of goes without saying, but it's good to know.
Indeed, but that doesn't make it sound any better. I think something like the Fractal method would be much better. He went with snowflake because the design of a snowflake is fractal.
1. Come up with idea. 2. Create a plot by designing characters that want something putting in their path obstacles to achieving their goal or desire. 3. Give them conflict inner and outter which will explain their motivation and how they respond to obstacles. Conflict usually comes from a past. 4. make a happenings list - jot down the things that could happen or you want to happen and sort them out according to a time line because you're going to want a beginning, a middle and an end. Rising conflict, twists, setbacks and resolution. 5. Optional (theme) by the time you've made yourself a rough outline you might see a theme emerging and you can tweak your scenes to layer in the idea, bolster it and help tie everything together though this might not happen till after your first draft. not everything has to be set in stone before your first draft. After I was done with my storyline I started writing and realized I would not make it to the book's middle section where the character jumps in age from 14 to 31. I scrapped half my outline and ran with an idea that came spur of the moment, shifted a characters appearance - instead of meeting at age 31 the boy meets him at 15 - and transformed my novel. It happens.
If you were implying that using plotting software or a story structure makes writing formulaic, that just isn't true. Maybe there are some methods or softwares that force you into a formula, but I haven't found one yet. Plottr and the Snowflake method definitely don't, they're both completely flexible. You can move anything around wherever you want, and of course you come back in whenever necessary and make changes. That's the beauty of using a plotting method (or software). It allows you to check for problems before writing 20,000 words. It's a lot easier to fix it when you're just developing an outline or a timeline than when you've got a half-finished first draft that you just realized you messed up way back near the beginning.
I was more thinking that, even though snowflakes are made of water each one is supposed to be unique, just as a with a story the basics are the same but the details are unique.
I think every concept should beg the question "what if?" and open new doors to answer it. Starting with a situation is key. Even if certain plot points come to you first then the answers you have to come up with are in between them. Ask your what if this happened and later this happened? How would your characters reach such milestones or events? The answer is in the "what ifs?" I don't plot at all (and I mean at all) before writing. But no matter how you approach your story, I think every writer needs to constantly revisit the question of "what if?" for a story to unveil itself and become a cohesive work.
