Today, I’m over at The Winged Pen’s Master Your Craft blog post series.
What–you ask–is Master Your Craft? Each Wednesday, the Winged Pen discusses prewriting and drafting a new book from the BIG IDEA to QUERYING.
(Handy list of Master Your Craft topics so far.)
My post is about that devious stretch of story landscape known as “the saggy middle.” This morning, I realized I left something out: sketching.
Sketching is what you do when you’re feeling your way into a piece. This isn’t about the whole outline versus drafting controversy. As we all know, there’s more than one way to figure out a story. I always have to use ALL the ways.
Drafting, in my mind, is letting the imagination lead you through an experience.
Outlining, in my mind, is hovering above a story to see which way you’re headed before dropping back down into it.
A sketch tests a tricky part of your outline on another scale. . .if my hero said this, what would happen? Sketch it and find out. Test your thinking with your imagination.
A sketch hints at a possible sequence in your “messy draft”. . .make a list of scenes you’ve already written. Do they make a chain? Test your imagination with your thinking.
I’m sure this seems obvious to all you industrious writers, so what’s my point?
Alternating between outlining and sketching can get you there when everything seems hopelessly stuck. Libbie Hawker writes about “beats” to fill out a story outline. Rachel Aaron writes about the power of getting excited about a scene you are going to write.
Do you do something similar? Or something very different? Please share in the comments.
Read the Winged Pen post on “saggy middles” here.
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