Megan’s answer to “Hey Megan! My name is Tianna. I can't wait to read your book! I am working on writing a book right …” > Likes and Comments
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Thank you so much Megan! Thank you so much for answering me with such detail! It means a lot to me! :) I do have more specific questions, quite a few acutely, so It means a lot that you are so willing to let me just ask you! :) So my first question is how do you outline a novel? Like I know that people say that you have to write out your beginning, middle, and end but I don't know how you write them out. I also have a lot more questions about outlining but I figured I probably shouldn't pile them all on you in this one comment. :)
Glad to help! I think everyone outlines a little differently, but I'd love to share how I tackle it. So generally if you have a novel idea you have an idea of where you want it to start or where you want it to end, ideally both. I call my method (in my head) the Movie Scene Method, but it may very well have an official name. I sort of stumbled into the practice on my own, so I'm not really sure if it's common or not. But I'll detail my process.
Take two pages, one will represent the start of your novel, and one the end. Now write on them all the details you've already decided on (generalization is fine). For example, my starting page had things like details about my MC's character, how the novel would start with her trapped in an underground compound, and what I wanted her starting mental state to be like. Then I did the same with the ending page. Don't worry if you don't have a lot of details in the beginning, it's normal. So from here place the two pages on opposite ends of a desk, or floor (if you have a cat you may want to trap them in the bedroom at this point to prevent disruptive paws, speaking from experience) and grab a HUGE stack of note cards.
Now view the space between the two pages as the timeline in a movie. Each notecard, will represent a scene. Generally, my scenes happened to be chapter length, so in my case, this also made breaking my novel up very easy later in the process.
Now ask yourself, what needs to happen to get your MC from start to end. If you think of a scene, write out a description on a note card and a quick title you will understand (I had one titled 'The Overseer in the Lace Panties' for a while that made my boyfriend very amused and curious) and place it somewhere in the timeline. Then you can ask yourself what needs to happen to get from start to the new point. If you have some scenes in mind you know you want to include, write some quick descriptions on notecards, and lay them out in the general places along the empty space between the start and end page. Now try to fill in the gaps. For example, if you know that in the middle of your novel your MC is going to get some devastating news, but then soon after you want them to have a period of clarity, what kind of event takes them from one plot point to the next?
Writing out the scene descriptions on notecards Is helpful because you can easily rearrange things in the timeline, which I did a lot. And whenever you find arrangements you like you can write the order down or take a picture. This method works best if you already have a few major scenes you know you want to work in, because the smaller the gaps between scenes on your timeline, the easier it is to think of scenes to fill in the blanks.
If you don't have a lot of plot points in mind already, one of my absolute favorite tips, is to take a peak at the Heroe's Journey (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hero%27...). When I was just starting out, before I even learned to outline, I used the Heroe's Journey as a template, and it made my life a lot easier. I wrote the stages of the heroes journey as the titles on note cards and tried to picture the way my MC fit into them, and wrote down any scenes that came to mind. If you use this method, don't force yourself to use every stage of the Heroe's Journey, and feel free to venture beyond it. Using the Heroe's journey as a template can help you get an idea of a tried and true pattern of plot points. View it more as a hand drawn map, it will give you guidance, but ultimately, where your novel ends up will depend a lot on your interpretation of the landmarks, and don't worry if you end up somewhere completely new and unexpected.
Sorry if that was a bit long and scattered. I will probably do a more scripted video on plot mapping soon, you can also check out a blog post I wrote a while back (https://megantennant.com/3-awesome-ti...). And I'm definitely going to be doing a video on the Heroe's Journey sometime soon, because I love it!
Thank you so much! That was perfect because it was detailed! I have a problem when it comes to something not being detailed enough because I guess I just don't understand it. :) Thank you, I am pretty sure that I will be using the "Movie Scene Method" In my near future! :)
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Tianna Grace
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Apr 10, 2017 03:00PM
Thank you so much Megan! Thank you so much for answering me with such detail! It means a lot to me! :) I do have more specific questions, quite a few acutely, so It means a lot that you are so willing to let me just ask you! :) So my first question is how do you outline a novel? Like I know that people say that you have to write out your beginning, middle, and end but I don't know how you write them out. I also have a lot more questions about outlining but I figured I probably shouldn't pile them all on you in this one comment. :)
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Glad to help! I think everyone outlines a little differently, but I'd love to share how I tackle it. So generally if you have a novel idea you have an idea of where you want it to start or where you want it to end, ideally both. I call my method (in my head) the Movie Scene Method, but it may very well have an official name. I sort of stumbled into the practice on my own, so I'm not really sure if it's common or not. But I'll detail my process.Take two pages, one will represent the start of your novel, and one the end. Now write on them all the details you've already decided on (generalization is fine). For example, my starting page had things like details about my MC's character, how the novel would start with her trapped in an underground compound, and what I wanted her starting mental state to be like. Then I did the same with the ending page. Don't worry if you don't have a lot of details in the beginning, it's normal. So from here place the two pages on opposite ends of a desk, or floor (if you have a cat you may want to trap them in the bedroom at this point to prevent disruptive paws, speaking from experience) and grab a HUGE stack of note cards.
Now view the space between the two pages as the timeline in a movie. Each notecard, will represent a scene. Generally, my scenes happened to be chapter length, so in my case, this also made breaking my novel up very easy later in the process.
Now ask yourself, what needs to happen to get your MC from start to end. If you think of a scene, write out a description on a note card and a quick title you will understand (I had one titled 'The Overseer in the Lace Panties' for a while that made my boyfriend very amused and curious) and place it somewhere in the timeline. Then you can ask yourself what needs to happen to get from start to the new point. If you have some scenes in mind you know you want to include, write some quick descriptions on notecards, and lay them out in the general places along the empty space between the start and end page. Now try to fill in the gaps. For example, if you know that in the middle of your novel your MC is going to get some devastating news, but then soon after you want them to have a period of clarity, what kind of event takes them from one plot point to the next?
Writing out the scene descriptions on notecards Is helpful because you can easily rearrange things in the timeline, which I did a lot. And whenever you find arrangements you like you can write the order down or take a picture. This method works best if you already have a few major scenes you know you want to work in, because the smaller the gaps between scenes on your timeline, the easier it is to think of scenes to fill in the blanks.
If you don't have a lot of plot points in mind already, one of my absolute favorite tips, is to take a peak at the Heroe's Journey (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hero%27...). When I was just starting out, before I even learned to outline, I used the Heroe's Journey as a template, and it made my life a lot easier. I wrote the stages of the heroes journey as the titles on note cards and tried to picture the way my MC fit into them, and wrote down any scenes that came to mind. If you use this method, don't force yourself to use every stage of the Heroe's Journey, and feel free to venture beyond it. Using the Heroe's journey as a template can help you get an idea of a tried and true pattern of plot points. View it more as a hand drawn map, it will give you guidance, but ultimately, where your novel ends up will depend a lot on your interpretation of the landmarks, and don't worry if you end up somewhere completely new and unexpected.
Sorry if that was a bit long and scattered. I will probably do a more scripted video on plot mapping soon, you can also check out a blog post I wrote a while back (https://megantennant.com/3-awesome-ti...). And I'm definitely going to be doing a video on the Heroe's Journey sometime soon, because I love it!
Thank you so much! That was perfect because it was detailed! I have a problem when it comes to something not being detailed enough because I guess I just don't understand it. :) Thank you, I am pretty sure that I will be using the "Movie Scene Method" In my near future! :)
