Outline or Not?

Age-old question: Should I outline, should I write by the seat of my pants, or should I do something in between? The answer is: Yes and no.

I saw Cormac McCarthy tell Oprah that outlining would be death. Stephen King, in his book “On Writing,” said essentially the same thing. Anne Rice says she’s done it both ways, but generally doesn’t outline. She prefers not knowing what’s going to happen.

When I wrote A Beast in Veniceand “Self-Portrait of a Dying Man,” I did not outline.

But, is that g...