#I moved cities again and the burnout after last year whacked me very hard. Brain go (half-hearted raspberry noise)

[threewaysdivided]

hi 3wd. i’ve tried to write before and i’ve never gotten far in the process, despite having many ideas im enthusiastic about. all your blogging about being a planner-writer has got me thinking i might have the same style of writing as you l- and a lot of the reason im struggling to put words on paper is because i don’t have a direction or fleshed out emotional/plot beats to write towards. what would be your advice to any fledgling planner-writers that don’t know where to start? how did you start writing with this writing style?

Hey nonnie 💜

It can be super frustrating to have a bunch of pieces you want to play with but not have them come together in a way that maintains traction.  Outlining could definitely be a potential tool to help sustain momentum, so let’s see if I can get some gears turning for you.

For me personally, the outline-approach is one I just sort of fell into naturally.  Part of it comes from my school days; we were encouraged to write dot-point plans to structure our arguments/ research/ storytelling for assignments ahead of drafting (some teachers even counted evidence of it towards the final grade), which set it as a habit early.  Fun fact: I actually outlined this answer before writing it; I do it for most long posts.  Another part of it is that I tend to come at writing from a very analytical angle - there’s a degree to which I try to solve or understand stories as I consume them.  One of my earliest casual jobs was working as an English/Lit tutor for high-schoolers.  I find a lot of joy in picking narratives apart, figuring out how they work and finding ones that hold up through several layers of examination, so as a writer I like to construct stories that way.

Part of it is also that, when I want to write something for release, I’m conscious of the fact that it will have an audience.  A question that hangs around in the back of my mind is “if I found this story and wasn’t the writer, would I enjoy reading it?”

There’s another aspect that has to do with respect, in a way.  I love the worlds and the characters that I use in my stories, and for me that means writing things that feel true to their spirit, giving significance to the times when that changes and making sure they have a meaningful journey (even if it’s not a happy one).

For me outlining suits this ethos, since having a map of future directions makes it easier to place foreshadowing fairly, identify themes, build character arcs and keep explanations/ lore consistent.

I’m also going to admit that I just got lucky with Deathly Weapons. There was a very specific emotional idea that I wanted to centre a story around, and the inspiration happened to come with both a starting premise and a concept for the ending.  Then I also had wish-lists; some tropes I wanted to play with, and some existing series whose storytelling structure I wanted to emulate and pay homage to.  Something I realised a few years after starting DW is that I’m a very project-and-output-oriented person.  In a way, Deathly Weapons’ came to me as a project brief where I already knew the end-goal and a lot of what I wanted to work towards.

With that said, let’s talk outlining:

The value of having a plan

To me, an outline is a bit like having an itinerary for a road-trip.  It gives you an idea of where you’re going, how long things will take, what key things you want to do, how much it might cost and it helps you anticipate potential problems.  But, like an outline, an itinerary isn’t binding.  There might be some things that take more effort to change (distance to travel, bookings you need to cancel/ reschedule/ extend - key plot points that a story hinges around or that need more preparation/ payoff to be effective) but you can adjust as you go; take extra time to explore an interesting spot, add a detour based on local recommendations, skip things that turn out to be less compelling than they first seemed, take a shorter route to get to a key destination faster, extend the trip to see a few more sights or decide to cut things short because something came up.   The itinerary gives you the security of already knowing where you’re headed, letting you put down the mental burden of having to work out each stop as you go and enjoy the moment more. 

Ways an outline can help:

Reassurance: if you have a tendency to be anxious/ self-critical/ have high standards about characterisation, plot holes etc. then an outline can be a good way to workshop the story and get ahead of potential challenges, as well as to concept-test whether this is a project you feel like committing to.

Scoping: blocking out an overview can help you get an idea of the size and complexity of the project, and how much time/resources/teamwork it might need.

Motivation: having a plan of future story moments that you’re looking forward to can provide a goal to help you push through the less exciting parts (e.g. connective scenes) and/or help you re-find your enthusiasm if you’re returning from a break or are feeling creatively flat for reasons outside the story itself.

Iteration: if you tend to come up with stories primarily by exploring and assembling ideas, then an outline method can be a way to quickly put a concept on paper, examine it and then decide if/how you want to use it, without the restriction of needing to write it all out as polished paragraphs first.

Splitting up the steps: useful if you tend to think faster than you can type full sentences, find that you move between ideas non-sequentially or if prose-writing/ sentence construction is something that takes a lot of mental energy or stop-and-starting from you.  An outline can be a way to separate the processes of story crafting and story telling into more-distinct stages rather than trying to juggle both at once.  Find the story first, then write it.

Non-sequential writing: having a roadmap of your story’s structure and direction can give you more freedom in how you choose to approach it, letting you jump ahead to work on planned future sections/scenes where the inspiration is flowing rather than waiting for the next scene to “come to you”.

For a more direct comparison, Screenwriting Bibles are a form of outline for professional TV/Film production.  These “bibles” are key reference documents used by writers for information on the premise, characters, settings and other project elements, as well as to plan future episodes and seasonal arcs.  (This podcast transcript, article and template are good starting sources if you want to learn more about TV Bibles.) 

Much like a series bible, an outline can help you keep tabs on:

Consistency and continuity: this can be minor stuff like names of background characters or small details (running gags, item descriptions, character trivia) but can also be major stuff like character motivations, who has what abilities, event timelines or story-themes.

Direction: your outline can capture the overall arc(s) and conflict source(s) of your story and their intended resolutions, as well as mapping out how those conflicts are progressing.

Causality: whether planned events and character choices feel consistent and reasonable within the internal logic of your story.

If any of this sounded helpful to you then you might benefit from experimenting with an outliner/ planner approach.  There are a bunch of different planner techiques (here’s a link for some) as well as hybrid “plan-tser” methods that you could try. But for now let's talk about the general process, starting with a focus question:

What is it that makes you want to tell this story?

This might seem like a daunting place to begin but it can help with figuring out the core of your story and what you find compelling.

It’s okay if you don’t have a neat-and-clean answer straight away.  Sometimes inspiration just strikes out of the blue, and that’s fine.  Sometimes you have a vague directional pull but you’ll need to do some story-work before you can identify what’s calling to you.  However, if you did have a specific itch or passion that drove you to write then thinking about what and why that is can help you understand what you want from the story – and in turn what might connect with other people.

I also want to be clear that this is not about judging your motivations or their “artistic merit”.  I had a specific story to tell is fine, as is I wanted to explore this concept/theme/emotion/issue, or this was a gift/commission for someone else, and so is I wanted to try writing a specific genre, or I wanted to experiment with a specific medium, or I wanted to do my own version of [existing idea] or I am fascinated by this character/relationship/world or I needed some vicarious catharsis, or I was horny.  And a whole bunch of other things.

Knowing what you’re trying to get out of a story can help you decide what type of story you want to tell, as well as the overall scope and what medium/format/genre to tell it in.  Maybe it’s a single-scene character/aesthetic study, or a one-shot vignette.  Maybe it’s one long story, or it could be series of connected stories, or it could be a story-anthology centring on a common idea.  Maybe this story would work well as a comic, or art piece(s), or podcast, video, or something interactive like a choose-your-own-adventure or a videogame.

Understanding where you’re coming from can also help you answer the questions of what is your story about? and what happens in your story? which are related but not the same. 

What is your story about concerns the themes and thesis of your story, which can help you figure out the story’s tone, main emotional or thematic conflict(s), and how you want them to resolve by the ending.  Put simply, it’s the message.

What happens in your story is the synopsis of planned events, character actions, worldbuilding and other content.  Put simply, it’s the stuff your story has in it.

Let’s take my Deathly Weapons fanfic as a case study:

What made me want to write this story? Deathly Weapons started with me being unsatisfied with what felt like a gap in the Danny Phantom x Superheroes crossover fanfic space at the time.  There was a trend where stories would kill Danny’s friends and family to justify placing him with the crossover’s other hero team but very few of those stories felt like they acknowledged the emotional consequences of doing so; the ones that allowed him to grieve frequently using it for nonspecific angst about Loss™ or mourning the generic archetypes of A Love Interest™, A Sister™, Parents™ or A Best Friend™ rather than the specific characters and bonds from the series.  There were also some smaller itches around plot construction and mysteries that I couldn’t find many stories to scratch.  I wanted to try writing something to fill those gaps. What is this story about? Thematically Deathly Weapon’s central emotional arc is about grief and healing: in particular the uniqueness of the bonds between people and how grief reflects the specific hole each individual leaves behind, as well as the process of finding closure, making new connections and moving forward in the aftermath of loss. What happens in this story? A lot.  In my youthful hubris and overambition I planned out basically a half-season of a TV show.  For the sake of not dragging this section out by a mile, here’s an arc/mission plot teaser list I made a little while ago.

Since Deathly Weapons Arc II is deliberately structured to emulate a TV show, you can sort of see how that summary has accidentally ended up mirroring parts of a top-down Pitch Deck.  But, of course, that’s not the outline I actually use when writing.

Different levels and types of outline

Like a lot of creative terms, “outlining” covers a pretty broad umbrella’s worth of stuff. 

Methods-wise there are plenty of different approaches: from specific story-writing software (Scrivener, Campfire etc.), to word documents, to binders and notebooks, to honest-to-goodness sticky-notes, thumbtacks and string.  Personally I alternate between a documents folder on my computer and a physical notepad/sketchpad for when I’m on the go, but you should pick whatever format feels most comfortable for how you process/visualise information.

Functionally, I think it helps to conceptualise three main levels of outline: Brainstorming, Structural and Detail.  To be clear, you don’t have to do all three.  A short story or one-shot might be served by writing directly from a brainstorming or light structural outline.  You also don’t have to keep them strictly separate.  A brainstorming document might cover some early structure notes or test paragraphs.  A structural or detailed outline might have some brainstorming or research sections as you uncover and solve smaller questions.  Heck, you can have detail notes inside your initial drafts if they help you keep the story flowing.  These are tools you can use, not prescriptions you need to follow.

Let’s talk about the levels:

Brainstorming

Brainstorming is the least structured.  Like the name suggests it’s mostly about getting concepts down and coming up with ideas – this could include early notes for plots beats/ scenes/ character interactions, sketches, screenshots/quotes and possibly research questions for stuff you want to confirm or find out about (e.g. checking source material, or researching systems and potential setting-locations).  You could consider this like early research notes for a class essay – where you know what your subject is and might start with some initial thoughts or focus questions but are still learning and figuring out the broad strokes of your content and stance.  

Despite that comparison, brainstorming is probably the most creatively fun step in the process.  This is not where you worry about things like “quality”, “cohesiveness”, “accuracy/canon compliance” or “cliches” – this is the time for rolling with whatever inspiration strikes you, pouring out any idea you find interested/compelling/cathartic, asking questions, going down internet rabbit holes and generally just enjoying unabashed creation.  This is your raw material: you’re going to cut and shape it later.

Structural

Structural outlines probably have them most utility in giving your story shape and form, especially if your story is long or has a lot of components.  If you were doing an essay, this is the part where you’d figure out your thesis and start grouping each main argument and its supporting points into planned body paragraphs.  For a story, this is where you start sorting your ideas and putting them in order; deciding on your arcs, conflicts and resolutions, working out the order and causality of events, your character motivations and dynamics, where to place key foreshadowing, major scenes and the like.  This is the level where you’re going to try and solve potential story problems – to come up with in-universe explanations and identify possible plot-holes before you write yourself into them.  You’ll likely do extra brainstorming or research in this phase too but it’ll be more targeted – aimed at filling gaps, connecting dots or serving specific needs. 

For longer or more complex stories you might have multiple structural outlines tracking different levels of granularity; some providing an overview of the whole story/ series arc, while other focus on specific characters/ subplots or break things down into individual plot beats and scenes.  You might also spin some of your initial brainstorming into reference or meta documents – content that you aren’t going to directly cover in-story but that will inform or add depth/consistency to other elements.  If you enjoy puzzle-solving then this can be a very satisfying part of the process: there’s nothing quite like hiding a subtle piece of symbolism/foreshadowing, coming up with a sneaky red-herring or finding a rock-solid explanation to make you feel extremely clever.

It’s also worth repeating that you are not beholden to whatever structural outlines you first come up with – your outlines can and should evolve with you as you develop your story and come up with new or alternate ideas.  (Just last year I re-ordered two major subplots and added an extra character arc for Deathly Weapons).

Some stuff to think about for structural outlining:

Remember that, as the storyteller you have full control of the narrative and what happens inside it.  Like I said at the start of my case study on YJ: Invasion’s writing, even the rules of a fiction piece are made up: there is nothing physically stopping you from making the sky be a different colour every five minutes if you felt like it.  If you want something to happen then you can work backwards to reverse-engineer a specific scenario where those things would reasonably occur.  Start at Scene B and figure out what needs to happen to get there from Established Starting Point A.  If you need a character to act a certain way, then you can tailor a situation to trigger that response based on their established personality/ insecurities/ flaws.  You can manufacture specific story problems whose solutions play toward or against the skills and abilities of different characters, or create scenarios which situationally discourage characters from using skills/abilities/tools that might otherwise be overpowered. You can also make the call to deviate from what has been established in order to facilitate a scene or plot point - temporarily imposing a trait for narrative purposes (sometimes referred to as carrying a ball) or Rules Lawyering your worldbuilding to create a technical loophole.  This risk here is that this can feel artificial, jarring or unfair if not reasonably justified within the story logic.  There’s also a limit on how often/ how far you can push this before it risks breaking the story.  If things start to contradict or situations arbitrarily turn on a dime then your audience can lose trust that the characters and world will follow the expectations set by the narrative – they can start to feel narratively unsafe, until it reaches a point where the only way for them to reconcile the dissonance and inconsistencies in the story is to acknowledge that it’s all an artificial construct being externally steered by the hand of the author.   You can do whatever you want… provided you do the work to make audience to believe it.

That being said, try not go get too wedded to the specifics of your early ideas.  Sometimes an element is just not going to fit with the direction your story ends up taking; whether because it’s not compatible with the eventual trajectory of the characters/events/lore or simply because it would be hard to include without disrupting/diverting/distracting from the flow of the story at that point.  In some instances you can take the core of an idea and modify it to find a new place in the narrative; for example by repurposing a scene or piece of dialogue, repackaging information, rescheduling a conversation, fusing concepts together or deconstructing them and integrating the component parts across other scenes.  But in other cases you may decide that the potential problems (whether structural or narrative) introduced by including an element outweigh the value it could add – in which case it’s time to lovingly set it aside.  This is what they mean when they say kill your darlings.  Having a designated document for future story ideas and/or outtakes can help with this (or you could do what I did with Defining Moment and turn an idea into its own side-story).

This can be also a good place to consider more technical story elements, like pacing.  Think about the peaks and valleys of intensity (suspense, intrigue, action, character drama etc.) across the beats of your story; where you might want to ramp things up or down, and how you might use scene and/or chapter breaks to space out information, create breathing room or hold the audience at a certain level of emotion/anticipation.  (For a good short primer, try these videos about Pacing and Tension Cycles in games).

You may also like to use the structure overview as an opportunity to take stock of Tropes and Patterns.  Not to avoid them – you can’t really avoid tropes – but just to see if any are showing up and what they might be saying, even if you didn’t intend for that to happen.  (For a topical example: consider what tropes are showing up around different minority/minority-analogous characters - either in their depictions or how the story treats them - and what message that might be sending.  There’s a lot of bias to the way certain groups and issues have historically been portrayed in media, some of which have baked themselves into now-common stock plots and archetypes.  That isn’t to say you should never use them; just be conscious and careful, especially if your story intends to make some sort of commentary on those topics.)  On a more positive note, this can be another way to learn about what story mechanics you like, both in your own writing and others’.

Detail

Detail notes are the most granular level of outlining, getting down into the specifics of an individual scene or conversation.  These are the least strictly necessary – depending on the length/ complexity of your story, the granularity of your structural outline(s) and your personal writing preference, you may prefer to jump directly from a structural outline into a first draft.  That said they can still be useful, especially if you want to hammer out the fine details of action, dialogue or information-flow while staying a step back from specific prose.  This is where you get things like a bullet-point breakdown of each line/action/piece of narration (for when you have a detailed idea of what’s going to be said/done but not the specific words to describe it) or script-style notes (for when you have the character voices and lines but not the narration or action surrounding it).  As mentioned earlier, you can blend detail notes and rough drafting together – writing some sections out in prose as the words come to you, then breaking into note-form to keep the ideas flowing in sections where wording might be starting to stick. 

An example

Let’s look at my outlining system for Deathly Weapons:

Now, I want to make it clear: this is not the standard.  This is not even the standard for me.  Deathly Weapons got a bit out of hand, ballooning into a half-season of a TV show: it’s more a series of 12+ self-contained stories in a trench coat than your standard fanfiction.  However, it is a decent example of complex outlining.  I have multiple levels of structural outline – some covering the entire story arc, some covering the individual missions.  I also have quick-notes that I made as a consistency-reference from canon, and some worldbuilding meta I did as a thought exercise to develop one of the character-backstories (the one shown ended up published here on Tumblr).  You can see how I blend the outline types together in my detailed notes, as well as how my approach to outlines has evolved from more brainstorming-focused to more structurally-focussed as the story has solidified.  Again, this is not the standard, but hopefully it gives you an idea of what you can get up to with outlines for a complex long-term project.

Okay, so that’s the basic breakdown of outlining as a process (at least the version I use).  Hopefully it’s got some gears turning. 

However, I also know that it’s more of a framework through which to approach story-building; it’s an organisational tool that helps you set out current and future-planned content in a way that lets you take stock, identify things that need attention and keep track of important details.  On its own it’s not necessarily going to be able to help address the challenges it reveals; in the same way that knowing how to plan an essay won’t necessarily teach you how to research one effectively. 

In Part 2 of this series (yep it's a series now) I'm going to go over some concepts for story-building and editing that might help you during the structural phase. Click here to go to the next part >>