Weekend Writer: Plotting, Pantsing, Plantsing, and April Goals

Hey all, Sam here.

All right-y…well, I had this post ready to go for yesterday, and I guess I just didn’t remember to hit publish before I closed up my computer to go to work. Thank goodness this series is called Weekend Writer, because I can technically post it late (but still on the weekend) and it’s valid.

This is sort of a bonus week for Weekend Writer, because the first Friday of the month I share some creativity prompts (find March’s here), and on the last Friday I share some writing–either based on the prompts or something else I’ve been working on. For the other Fridays, one is usually a review of a writing craft book (The 5 Sentence Method review), and one is typically a deeper breakdown or trial of the concepts from the book. But this month has yet another Friday…so I’m just having a general discussion about a topic that is related to this month’s writing craft book.

Without further ado, let’s get into it.

Experience TikTok’s viral 5 Sentence plotting method, written by bestselling author Rebecca Thorne!

Discover the game-changing 5 Sentence Method in this straight-talking, no-BS guide to crafting fantastic fiction. In just 5 SENTENCES, you’ll nail your plot points and tie them to specific word count goals, ensuring your story has the pace and rhythm to keep readers hooked.Even better, this bite-sized book explores a 4 round editing strategy that will make your revisions a breeze. Expect comprehensive examples, a few curse words, and a ton of valuable insight! Whether you’re a newbie or a seasoned author, this guide will transform the way you write, edit, and think about storytelling.

It’s time to make your book shine!

—-Feedback for The 5 Sentence 

“I had so many ah-ha moments reading it.” – Chris B.

“Incredibly helpful and immensely valuable.” – Sara M.

“So many eureka moments here!” – Amy N.

Discussion

The reason I’m partnering this discussion with this book is because Rebecca Thorne herself says that The 5 Sentence Method is for people who want to try plotting and don’t know where to start or for pantsers who want to have a little more structure and planning before writing.

There are so so many posts and videos and discussions out there about the Plotting vs Pantsing writing camps, and most people fall solidly in one camp or the other, but there are some that blend the two a bit. I’ve always thought that there are three camps, plus a blending of them….Plotting, Pantsing, and Percolating.

Plotters. These are the people who have fully formed outlines, possibly character dossiers and most or all of their story planned.

Pantsers fly by the seat of their pants. They might have a couple lines of plot or idea written down, and maybe even a few sentences about each character. For the most part though, they figure out the story as they go.

Percolators are the camp I connect with most. I percolate, ponder, think on what I’m going to write for a time…it could be days or weeks or months of daydreaming about it, but eventually I know enough about the characters and the plot and the setting to just sit down and write. In a way I guess this is like plotters, except I don’t usually write it down. To those who don’t know my process, I know it can seem like I’m a full pantser but I do have a plan in my mind.

I’ve never been able to make a full outline, at least not for a first draft. If I write too much of the scenes and plot down then it feels like I’ve already written the book and I lose all desire to fully draft the story.

That’s why I wanted to try The 5 Sentence Method. It really felt like the kind of plotting method that would be perfect for me, just enough to give me an overarching plot, but not so much that my mind would believe that the story is written already. You can see my attempt at The 5 Sentence Method in last week’s Weekend Writer post.

And honestly….I do like this plotting method. It is vague enough that my mind still wants to write the story, and I can expand on it a little bit with random bullet points. So, I can definitely see myself utilizing The 5 Sentence Method with future writing projects as well.

April Goals

I have a writing group on Discord. It was originally started as the Iowa Elsewhere region for NaNoWriMo…but considering some of the recent drama and changes within the organization, we have changed our name and will no longer associate with the writing challenge.

But we still wanted to set up a challenge for the month of April, one open to folks with plotting goals, writing goals, editing goals, marketing goals…basically whatever stage of the creative process each person needed to focus on at the moment. We have a thread in our Discord to announce our goal and then post updates.

Since I’m in the middle of drafting my current WIP, my goal for April is to add 30,000 words to the draft. Obviously I’m trying to spend a little more time writing, so hopefully I’ll do even more than this, but I think 1000 words a day isn’t a terrible goal. And I’ll try to keep a weekly update going here on the blog.

That means I’m spending the next week doing some rough plotting so I’m ready for it. Basically I’ll be taking my 5 sentences from last week’s post and jotting down whatever reminder bullet points I need for my upcoming scenes.

If you’re a writer and would like to be a part of our writing Discord, we’d love to have you join up. Tell me in the comments and I’ll get you an invite code.

Well, that’s all for today. Thank you so much for stopping by and I’ll be back soon with more geeky content.