That's it ... I'm writing this damn story backwards

[sholio]

For some reason I'm having incredible trouble plotting out "Ghost". My usual way of writing is to do little scenes from throughout the story and then proceed forward from the beginning, linking 'em up. It's the linking up that I'm having trouble with. Every time I start writing chronologically, I either write myself into a corner or realize that I'm revealing too much, too soon, so I have to scrap what I've written and start over.

I think I might try writing it from the end of this particular chapter towards the front. Feh. This is a hard one. I do have the next chapter (after the prologue) written, but I don't want to post it because I want to have the ability to change things if this chapter doesn't work out. Again.

Comments

[tipper-green.livejournal.com]

Oh, wow, you write so differently from me! I can only point to one story that I wrote like that, and I never finished it (Just an original story I wrote in college, before I discovered fanfic). I think I'd be afraid that, once all the "fun" scenes are written, I wouldn't have the patience to link them up. Which is what happened to that college story. I think it's really neat to learn that that is how you write most stories. So funky! Your stories always read so effortlessly--you'd never know they were written in pieces. Sort of like, never knowing that an episode of a show is shot out of order. (And I really do find that amazing, too--how the actors can stay focused blows me away).

Me, I do sometimes write the major "dream" scene first--i.e., the scene that makes me want to write the story--but most of the time, because I don't trust myself, I force myself to write chronologically. That way, if there isn't anywhere I need to get to *exactly*, then I can relax a bit more along the way. Of course, sometimes that means it takes me even longer to get there (current story I'm writing being a perfect case in point. Seventy pages of set up?! What the heck?!)

That being said, I totally understand why you don't want to post. I usually won't post until I'm certain the story is "finished" -- far enough along that I don't have to change it. (Unless, of course, I start freaking about about the story being too long).

Oh, and I have, once or twice, written a story backwards. Bled out from a central piece. But that's rare. Still, it's totally doable! I wish you luck! It almost sounds fun! LOL!

[sholio]

It's always completely fascinating to me to find out how other people's writing process works! Thank you for the kind words about my stories. (And I'd never thought to compare it to a TV show being filmed out of order. It's quite impressive to me that they can make that work, too!)

I've always found that it works best for me to work on whatever part of the story inspires me most at the moment. I'm perfectly capable of beating my head against the writing wall and slogging through a part that I don't want to work on, but I find that it takes me about twice as long to write a story if I try to do the whole thing chronologically, because I feel like I spend most of my time spinning my wheels at those sticky places, rather than working on the parts that I actually WANT to work on. It might be counter-intuitive, but it's easier for me to get past a sticky place if I know that right down the line is a part of the story that's all written and ready to go, and all I have to do is struggle through the hard part and then I'll have a huge chunk of the story written ... rather than depressively staring at another 17 unwritten chapters stretching out in front of me.

On the other hand, I wonder if I might have fewer plot problems with my stories if I didn't have so many of the major plot points written in stone, as it were, so that I keep trying to make them work even when it would really be better to just scrap and rewrite them!

I wanted to start getting "Ghost" up before Halloween, but I'm starting to wonder if that was really a good idea, because now I feel obligated to work on it even though it's not going well. I'm about to the point of just letting it sit for a little while and coming back to it in a couple of days when I've had time to think about it for a while.

[leenys.livejournal.com]

Let it sit. Don't give in to your own pressure, you won't be satisfied with the result. Been there, done that, own the t-shirt factory.

Sounds like you write as I do. I can go chronological for just so far, then I start adding random scenes and leaving spaces with notes in between them and find that I have to rewrite an earlier scene to work with a later scene because I like the later scene too much to change it...or a later scene runs off with another plot and I don't realize it until reading an earlier scene and realize I've totally changed the story...yeah. Makes you want to shove your head through the computer and chew on the motherboard.

[sholio]

I think this is excellent advice, and pretty much what I'm planning on doing. I'm rarely happy with the results when I force myself to write -- a little bit of that kind of discipline is good, certainly, but continuing to write when I have no inspiration for it just results in lifeless writing.