Hello, writers. It’s my understanding that there are some writers out there who sit down and map out a plot, making a note of what will happen in each scene, write a novel according to their outline, go through and put a good polish on it, and then hit “send”.
Or anyway they claim they do.
What I do is sit down and make a plan, carefully noting what will happen in each scene. Then I write the thing, and it wobbles all over the place like a drunk trying to walk a straight line. It hits the plan maybe once or twice. Then I sit down and rewrite the plan, and inevitably at this point I run into questions.
Questions like:
Why is Euphemia refusing to go to Nebraska? (Because she has something to fear there.) What does she have to fear? (She won’t tell anyone. It’s a secret.) Yes, but what is this friggin’ secret?
I used to find questions scary. I thought I had to answer them quickly or the whole plot might fall apart in my hands, like a gingerbread house with not enough frosting. If I didn’t figure out what Euphemia’s secret was pronto, I was going to lose my momentum and not achieve every writer’s ultimate dream of Finishing The Damn Thing.
Then I realized the question is more important than the answer. Grabbing for the first answer that comes to mind means getting a cliché, something that’s been done a thousand times before and that the reader will see coming. Boring. Also, not organic. Not the right answer for your character and your story.
In the above example, the mere fact that Eupemia’s got something to fear in Nebraska and yet events are willy-nilly dragging her there anyway-- or she sets her jaw and chooses to go there, perhaps mounted on a dragon-- will keep readers turning pages. Celebrate the question. Indulge it.
But do figure out the answer. The right answer, not the convenient one. Some of my favorite tricks for finding the right answer—
- The Rule of 20, which we’ve talked about on here before. Make a list of 20 possible answers. In my experience #17 is usually the correct one.
- The endless rewrites… Okay, this isn’t really a favorite, but it does work. The better you get to know your characters and story, the more likely it is you’ll see the answer to your question, staring you right in the face.
- Walking it out. Unfortunately family emergencies and bad ankles have made this one hard for me to manage lately, but in my experience the very best answers tend to come from walking.
Any other suggestions for dealing with questions?
Tonight’s challenge:
Euphemia is hiding something. It’s the reason she can’t go to Nebraska. Write a dialogue between Euphemia and Bonzo in which it is clear that she doesn’t want to tell Bonzo why she can’t go to Nebraska with him, and yet she’s determined not to go.
Make the reader want to know what Euphemia’s hiding. It’s not necessary to reveal what this thing is. (It’s not even necessary, at this point, that you know what it is.)
By the way, this will work better if Bonzo's your viewpoint character. Hiding something the viewpoint character knows is considered gauche-- the sort of thing famous writers do all the time but unfamous writers shouldn't risk.
Alternative challenge for Togwogmagog enthusiasts:
A callow youth and his/her stout companion are searching for the Jewel of Togwogmagog. They come to the village of Onionset, where the youth believes there is an old beldam who knows something about the Jewel. But stout companion refuses to enter the village, and won’t say why. Write the dialogue in which the CY tries to convince the SC to change his/her mind.
Don’t explain why the SC is so timid in re Onionset.
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