Generating Events in your Outline
I can never say my outlining process is done, even after I got the basic events of the plot, there are still likely to be plot holes I need to plug, changes based on suggestions from alpha-readers, and the ideas I have while I’m actually writing the manuscript. But I did hit a major milestone in that list last week: the first one. I did the first one.
The outline I have for The Centuries Unlimited is more robust than any of the outlines of my previous books, and I worked for a long time on it (two months plus). It might have taken longer, but fortunately I listened to this episode of Writing Excuses at just the right time (I’m pretty sure it’s this one), and they gave me some great ways to generate events in my outline. Here they are.
Ask, what does the character want?
I’ve had bad luck before with not making my character’s goals clear, or switching goals halfway through the book. Don’t do that. Give the character something they want but can’t have right at the beginning and don’t give it to them until the end (if then). For example:
The Hero wants to win the hand of the princess.
Yes But No And
A goal isn’t enough, though. You need the Hero to do insteresting things in pursuit of that goal. For everything the protagonist tries to do in the story, there’s a question of whether they’ll succede. There can’t ever be an unimitaged sucess until the end of the book, so answering the question with “yes, but” or “no, and” gives the hero something to do next. Here’s how it works:
The Hero tries to slay a dragon. Does it work?
Yes, but that dragon’s blood was cursed, and now the Hero is cursed.
The Hero visits a priest to have the curse removed. Does it work?
No, and the priest, horrified, calls upon the townspeople to pursue the Hero into the forest.
The Hero tries to escape the townspeople. Does it work?
Yes, but the cursed Hero kills a townsperson, provoking them to call in the local knight.
And so on.
Generate and solve problems symmetrically
This was the major breakthrough that let me finish my damn outline. It’s easy to generate problems using Yes And No But, but around the middle of the book, the Hero has to start solving them. At this point, start solving problems in reverse order, so that the last problem created at the middle is the first one solved, and the last one solved is the first problem created (the one that’s central to the plot.) Like so:
The Hero figures out a way to talk to the knight without getting close enough to activate the curse. He enlists the knight’s help.
The knight talks to the townspeople, who agree to drop the whole thing in exchange for some dragon gold.
The priest just feels awful about this whole thing, and removes the curse.
The un-cursed Hero goes off and marries the princess.
This outline is a bit trite, but that’s okay. It needs some cleverer solutions for the problems (which can come from world building and research) and it needs some themes to resonate throughout the action. I might also try to fit this story into a formula like The Hero’s Journey or the Hollywood Formula and see if that suggests any new twists.
What do you guys think? Are there other ways I could tune up this outline?
