Image by phatcontroller via FlickrHow many scenes does the average novel have? Mine, after I made a little timeline, appears to have forty two with about three scenes per chapter. I wanted to make my usual tediously detailed outline for it by the end of today, but I don't think that's going to happen. I worked on it for a few hours yesterday and only outlined eight scenes.Yes, eight. Out of forty two. Looks like I've got to either give myself an extra day or down a gallon of coffee and work from now until Kingdom Come. I'm starting with the former, but like always will most likely switch my plans to the latter. Either way, it's work getting done, right?
I know I can't be the only one who sits there staring mindlessly at my blinking cursor unless I have a perfectly prepared outline of the scene. Seriously. I even need to divide the scene into a beginning, middle, and end. After that I divide the different parts of the scene into their own beginnings, middles, and ends. Sometimes I even go further than that, but I won't delve too deeply into my insanity. It makes people nervous.
I'll have to note that the excerpts I posted were done without any sort of scene outline at all (let alone the hyper detailed one that I prefer), which is why they tended to suck. I honestly don't see how some authors can spin a tale out of an outline that's basically just a bulleted list of the scenes. Everyone has a different process, though. Most indie authors, what with their freethinking ways and such, scorn the outline entirely.
Me, I need it to survive. I didn't even realize it until my current novel. All of my previous works were attempted with absolutely no outline at all, and they never made it past a few horribly written chapters with no concept of any sort of narrative arc. One common mistake of novelists is, after all, that they're writing a novel from beginning to end and literally making it up as they go. Makes foreshadowing a bit hard when you're literally writing the thing as a reader.
Looking back over my old writing makes me nervous. I shudder at how terrible it is, and back then I thought it was so good! That in turn makes me worry that what I'm writing now isn't good even though it at least feels decent. Isn't it frightening to work so hard on something that you might scorn later when you've gotten more experience?
Anyone else afraid of this? Or are you perfectly comfortable with laughing at your old work (whether it's in writing, art, performing, or sports) and beaming at how much you've grown? I wish I were. I'm going to try, anyway. I'm definitely going to do the whole, "wait a few weeks and then proofread again" once this baby is through, though.
I would like to close by leaving all you other indie authors out there with a link to one of my favorite blogs, Publetariat. I always get a kick out of the title, and it's an amazing source of valuable information for independent authors.
