Gah! Plot!
Dec. 31st, 2011 06:25 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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white_lotus fic is now twice as long as the longest thing I’ve ever written. It is a mess, goes nowhere, and every time I look at it I panic. It looks like it’s gone somewhere, though, because I keep writing bits I feel like writing, even if they aren’t supposed to happen yet. The problem is, it needs an actual plot and I DON’T WRITE PLOT. And I don’t know how to get the plot to start. I’m of half a mind just to scrap the whole thing, or even see if I can expand bits I’ve written into something that doesn’t need a plot. (This seems like the best plan.)
The problem is, I panic every time I think about it, and then avoid it. (This is what I do, especially when something seems too “big”) I was doing so well when I just thought of it in little pieces, but then I was all: “I’m writing this epic thing!” and then everything broke. (Today I managed to write 100 words, which is pretty good, but still no plot.)
But! I like the plot! It would totally be a story I’d read if I didn’t have to write the damn thing. People in my f-list who write long, plotty things (or just long things--the longest thing I’ve written before this was 1400+ words), HOW DO YOU DO IT?
white_lotus fic is now twice as long as the longest thing I’ve ever written. It is a mess, goes nowhere, and every time I look at it I panic. It looks like it’s gone somewhere, though, because I keep writing bits I feel like writing, even if they aren’t supposed to happen yet. The problem is, it needs an actual plot and I DON’T WRITE PLOT. And I don’t know how to get the plot to start. I’m of half a mind just to scrap the whole thing, or even see if I can expand bits I’ve written into something that doesn’t need a plot. (This seems like the best plan.)The problem is, I panic every time I think about it, and then avoid it. (This is what I do, especially when something seems too “big”) I was doing so well when I just thought of it in little pieces, but then I was all: “I’m writing this epic thing!” and then everything broke. (Today I managed to write 100 words, which is pretty good, but still no plot.)
But! I like the plot! It would totally be a story I’d read if I didn’t have to write the damn thing. People in my f-list who write long, plotty things (or just long things--the longest thing I’ve written before this was 1400+ words), HOW DO YOU DO IT?
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Date: 2012-01-01 12:41 am (UTC)I've been testing out the method in this blog post -- not necessarily b/c I want to write that many words a day, but just to see. I don't outline my fics b/c I never write anything that long. So it's been interesting to do as she suggests -- just write out (in 1 of the many little notebooks I seem to collect) specifically what is going to happen in the next scene I write. & then once that's done, sit down & write the scene according to that. On the one hand it's helpful, on the other I almost feel like, "I wrote that already, now I have to write it again!" I also get a lot of ideas just by writing w/o a perfect plan of where I'm going, so I don't want to squelch that.
Anyway! All that to say, maybe a tiny tiny miniplan might help keep you moving?
(I am terrible w/plot. The only plots I've written so far have been really... defined... in when they start/end: A baseball game! Someone gets kidnapped!)
Good luck!!
no subject
Date: 2012-01-01 06:30 pm (UTC)That's a very good plan!
I am terrible w/plot.
Plot is so hard! After panicking, I've found a way to make the central-conflict-thing much less epic than it was. Which means there are a lot fewer steps to solving it, and also, the characters can literally know where they're going next. (They didn't before.) I'm feeling better about it.
That method looks interesting! A lot of times it feels like I have to know exactly what I'll write before I write it (this is something I'm working on), but, like you, there are times when the writing goes really differently than I expected. (Also, sometimes writing w/ pen and paper bypasses the whole "must! be! perfect!" thing).
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Date: 2012-01-02 03:49 pm (UTC)Hand-writing notes is interesting for me -- I don't often do it, partly b/c I'm much slower, & various RSI-related woes mean that it is much more difficult for me to do than it used to be. So... my brief notes end up REALLY BRIEF. Sometimes that seems to stop me worrying too much about it though, like you said!
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Date: 2012-01-01 12:49 am (UTC)But I also really like plot and figuring out why and how someone might do something - I just worry over things until I figure out ways for the plot to work. This makes me a not-very-good last-stage beta, but a pretty decent bounce-things-off-of-mid-story-beta, if you want to chat about it with someone!
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Date: 2012-01-01 06:40 pm (UTC)This makes a lot of sense! For me, conversations and emotional things are much easier than stuff like: "So and so is looking for something important. What's their first step?"
This makes me a not-very-good last-stage beta, but a pretty decent bounce-things-off-of-mid-story-beta, if you want to chat about it with someone!
Thank you! I'll keep this in mind.
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Date: 2012-01-01 01:16 am (UTC)To use "Your Treasure Spent" as an example, I started out with the idea of Mai and Aang waking up early, getting their daughter ready for the day, and then handing her over to someone else and setting out to take down Azula.
Needless to say, the finished product bears only a passing resemblance to that idea. I had to go, "Okay, so this is an AU. Where did it diverge from canon? What happened next?" And that was how the actual posted version of "Your Treasure Spent" came into being, as a slightly too-elaborate set-up for that initial idea.
From there, I came up with certain set-piece scenes -- Zuko's death, Mai's relationship with Iroh, Azula's marriage and pregnancy. I knew where I wanted it to end -- with Mai and Aang kind of moving on, while Azula turns her attention from warfare to the construction of a vaguely theocratic system -- and it was just a matter of putting all the pieces in order and moving people into the right places.
However, I'm not completely sure I recommend this method, because it does leave me with a lot of pacing problems, and as with my Tophzula fic, often requires people to do stupid things in order to make the plot happen. And I'm not very good at keeping a lot of balls in the air.
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Date: 2012-01-01 06:52 pm (UTC)I've now
lowered my expectations forfixed the central conflict so that it's much smaller, but still fits a chunk of what I've written so far. This is probably better, as I like people interacting with each other and emotional things, and if there's too much adventure there won't be enough room for that stuff. It's like, instead of "This thing should happen! Then this!" my brain goes: "So-and-so's relationship with this person should influence this! And their relationship with THIS person should influence this!" It..is not good for writing plotty things.I feel better about it now!
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Date: 2012-01-01 09:10 pm (UTC)