Pantsing and Plotting
In writing a book, there's two ways to go about it: pantsing and plotting. When plotting, it can be anything from just writing out a general plot description down to outlining each individual chapter. Pantsing is quite different. Pantsing is short for "flying by the seat of your pants" which is basically just sitting down a the computer and seeing what happens. No plan; just run with it. That's how I write. I just see what happens next as it's coming out of my keyboard onto the screen.
It's my theory that as pantsers, our story is fully formed in our subconscious, just not close enough to the surface where we can get at it all at once. If we could, we might be plotters. But we can't so we're pantsers. We don't have plan. We don't have fully formed characters or settings. We have no idea what's going to happen on the next page. But somehow we end up with a whole book that way. Then we edit so the whole thing makes sense and flows well. Whether or not writing that way produces a good book depends on the writer, not the method.
I've written seven books, and have five others in progress. Up until now, I've just been a pantser. I like pantsing. Sometimes it's like I'm reading the book instead of writing it and that's fun.
One of the books I'm working on I started getting a flood of ideas on for all over the plot to the point that I was planning out the plot through the end of the book, which I'd never done before. I get little snippets regularly and I might have an idea of the general direction I want the story to go, but as to details, most of the time I don't have a clue. But this time I was having detailed ideas for the whole story, from where I am toward the beginning of the book to the end.
So about a week ago, I sat down to write out my ideas and typed out my plot. My whole book in three pages. It took me about five hours, which is a really long time for three pages (at least for me), but I basically just wrote a whole novel in five hours so that's pretty damn good. My first outline, or a type of outline for a book. Very basic, but it's there
I'm nervous to be a plotter for the first time. It's so different from pantsing that I'm worried I'll be bad at it. It's an experiment really.
Maybe I'll love plotting. Maybe I'll hate it. I have no idea. But I can't wait to find out.
It's my theory that as pantsers, our story is fully formed in our subconscious, just not close enough to the surface where we can get at it all at once. If we could, we might be plotters. But we can't so we're pantsers. We don't have plan. We don't have fully formed characters or settings. We have no idea what's going to happen on the next page. But somehow we end up with a whole book that way. Then we edit so the whole thing makes sense and flows well. Whether or not writing that way produces a good book depends on the writer, not the method.
I've written seven books, and have five others in progress. Up until now, I've just been a pantser. I like pantsing. Sometimes it's like I'm reading the book instead of writing it and that's fun.
One of the books I'm working on I started getting a flood of ideas on for all over the plot to the point that I was planning out the plot through the end of the book, which I'd never done before. I get little snippets regularly and I might have an idea of the general direction I want the story to go, but as to details, most of the time I don't have a clue. But this time I was having detailed ideas for the whole story, from where I am toward the beginning of the book to the end.
So about a week ago, I sat down to write out my ideas and typed out my plot. My whole book in three pages. It took me about five hours, which is a really long time for three pages (at least for me), but I basically just wrote a whole novel in five hours so that's pretty damn good. My first outline, or a type of outline for a book. Very basic, but it's there
I'm nervous to be a plotter for the first time. It's so different from pantsing that I'm worried I'll be bad at it. It's an experiment really.
Maybe I'll love plotting. Maybe I'll hate it. I have no idea. But I can't wait to find out.
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