#i'm gonna dive into drafts and try to get a good chunk done

[dragynfirearc]

i joined the trend and made a nsfw sideblog : @s3ducere . i'll be writing all nsfw content over there now. i think it'll make me feel more comfortable doing it.

[popatochisssp]

Hi. What's your writing process? Because I hear that outline stuff and honestly... I don't have a writing process, which might be why I'm a mess lmao. Please explain your magic Poppy!

‘Process’ might be too generous a word for how I do things, but I guess everybody kinda feels like they have no idea what they’re doing, so!

When it comes to a project, I start with an idea. For DL, as an example, that idea was, “I mentioned in my hcs at one point that Rus doesn’t really know how to do laundry, that would be a nice Meet Cute for him to run into somebody at a laundromat to help him out.”

Then from there, I kinda just think it through and expand on it– it could be a fic about Rus coming into his own and learning some life skills, that would be nice! How would his brother factor in…? Well, I’ve never done a poly fic before, I think it’d be fun to try one out, maybe if I…

So there the idea, and I probably mull over it for awhile, thinking up scenarios in my head based on the premise I have, usually not explicitly interconnected, just Things I’d Like To See, or Things That Would Be Funny/Cute/Romantic. Two problems– all these things are just sorta random, and also they exist only in my head where they’re probably gonna get lost or jumbled up if they stay in there, floating around in the mental void.

Which means it’s time for the outline step! I start to write down the ideas I’m having, very briefly and just enough to cover like, the general vibe of a part before jotting down the next one. When I see all the ideas written out in little bullet points like that, it’s easier to start organizing them– this thing has to happen before that thing, or hey, that thing would transition really well into this other one, those have to happen together… 

I can’t give a full example since DL’s ongoing and y’know, spoilers, but that eventually gives me the first full draft of the main outline, from where I think the story starts to where I want it to end. It’s like a little bare-bones timeline of what, broadly, is supposed to happen and when.

From there, I break it down into a chapter outline, so I take the relevant part of the full outline and elaborate on it. For example, here’s the chunk of paragraph that eventually turned into Chapters 6 & 7 of DL:

“Papyrus developing a crush on you, hanging out more even without tutoring, he’s getting a pretty good grasp on life skills and it’s boosting his confidence a lot, he’s starting to flirt with you and you’re SO conflicted—you like him, he’s cute, you’re DEFINITELY interested, but stars, you feel so guilty, you’re lying to him, accepting money from his brother, you feel downright scummy—so when he finally makes a move and tells you he really likes you (like-likes you) and tries to kiss you (while admittedly a lil drunk), you shoot him down and run away”

That’s the gist of what happened, obviously, but it’s super condensed and ultimately a lot more than what’s in there ended up happening! That’s ‘cause the chapter outline takes that ultra-distilled, ‘this is what’s gonna happen’ and breaks it out into ‘this is how that’s gonna happen.’ In this particular case, I open Ch 6 with a little of Papyrus’ perspective to show how he’s crushing, move to Reader’s perspective to show her inner-thoughts and set up the not-quite-a-date she has with Papyrus… buuuuut also I wanted to build up a little more narrative tension, for The Drama, so I ended the chapter with the misunderstanding fully in play and dive right into the failed drunken smooch with the next one.

But y’know, it goes from a simple, ‘Papyrus developing a crush on you’ to several lines of how his thought-process is going to be like (in the chapter outline, there’s about 350 words of that).

…which makes it a whole lot easier for me when I transition from there into the actual chapter-writing part! I don’t have to, on the spot, try to figure out what’s gonna happen, or how to transition this into that, I already did all that stuff in the planning phases– now, all I have to do is get started actually writing and see where the words go! XD

It’s hard to describe, y’know, all of what goes on in my head while I’m doing this stuff, so I hope this isn’t too confusing, and even if it is, everybody has their own way of doing things and finding inspiration/motivation/organization with their work. This is just how I do it, and it may be a total mess to someone else, but it’s what works for me!

You just gotta find out what methods work best for you! :3