When I began writing years ago, I was a pantster. A pantster is someone who writes by the seat of their pants. They don’t have an overall plan for their book and let the characters lead them where they want to go.
Creative Flow
At that point in my career, I felt that plotting, or writing an outline, would hurt my creative flow. But by not writing an overview, I was causing myself problems in the long run. Without an outline, I got lost in the story. I didn’t have proper character development and never had any idea how long the book was going to be. For a short story, this might not be a huge deal, but for a novel, it meant I had a lot of work to do during my second draft.
No Growth
Sadly, without an outline, you can get to the end of a manuscript, and your characters have had zero growth That is not a fulfilling novel for people to read. Your book needs action, conversations, and growth.
Chapter Totals and Wordcount
Now, I don’t write anything without an outline. It is much easier to keep the chapter and wordcount similar from book to book. Furthermore, I can decide on the story arch before I begin writing. It makes the process of storytelling less daunting. All you must do is finish one chapter. Then, once that chapter is fully fleshed out, you can move on to the next section.
Why People Give Up
I think one of the reasons that people give up on writing is because their characters get lost or start doing something else. And when your characters go off script, you have a bunch of work to do to make what you’ve already written flow with these new actions. This results in massive rewrites or tossing the manuscript in the trash.
Stop the Overwhelm
On the other hand, when you have an outline to go by and know what each chapter should include, it makes writing easy. My chapter summaries do not include everything that’s going to happen. Instead, I have a general idea of what is going to occur and what the characters are supposed to be feeling and/or doing. An outline keeps the story focused, your characters making progress, and allows you to break free from the overwhelm.
With a short story, there isn’t as much anxiety involved due to the concise word count. However, I still outline all my books. Right now, I have outlines for ten short stories and eight contemporary romance novels. I don’t have to stress about what to write when I finish a project. Additionally, when my mind is toast, but I still want to do something productive, I write an outline for another book.
Benefits of Outlines for Short Stories
Why would I recommend that you write an outline for a short story? An overview easily keeps your word count in mind with a short story. With a short story, your goal is to be under 7,500 words. If you don’t have an outline, you may be done way too soon and nothing, but sex has happened, or you might end up with a rambling 15,000 short story with not enough plot to be a novella.
Moreover, you want to ensure that your short story contains a plot and character development. With an outline, you can explore your theme, character traits, and what you want your book to achieve.
Outlines don’t have to be extensive. However, if you are comfortable with doing a fully explored outline, you may have scene description, dialogue, and character development plotted out. You don’t have to be handcuffed to your summary. If your characters start behaving in unusual ways – go with it.
With every experience we have in life, we continue to evolve. What sounded like a great idea several months ago, may not work anymore. Whenever your plot begins to deviate, you can update your outline, or consider if your outline is still plausible with adjustments made as you work.
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Alexia Chase
https://alexiachaseromance.com
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