Kitt Kestra

October didn't provide quite the well of productivity I'd hoped for, but I also feel fairly okay about how it went. I have made it through the intros I'd planned to start with, and am moving on to the actual outlining. I have started the first of those, although it's been slow going.

Also, the time change messes me up bad, and I know I'm probably about to absolutely lose my mind over how early it gets dark/how little sun I see.

Definitely need to pick up the pace a bit on this outlining.

Like I mentioned last week, my current plan is to work on getting the initial introductions of several projects completed.

These introductions are more for myself than anyone else, just getting down the initial information I want to have about the projects. It includes kind of a summary blurb, some bits about the characters and their planned arcs, the general tone and vibes that I want to convey, any specific dynamics or scenes or snippets of dialogue I already want to make sure to not forget, etc. Basically, just the stuff I want in order to reorient myself into the WIP once I get to actually working on it, and the things I don't want to forget if it takes me a while to get back to it. (I'd like to say "yeah, I'll remember that!" but that is the devil talking and I will not.)

Right now at least, it feels like slow going, ha. I really only have one more of those basic intros that I want to finish, and then the plan is to move onto actual outlines for some of these projects. I know that will take even longer, but I'm at least a little bit looking forward to getting to those.

I'm planning to try out the "Snowflake Method" of outlining. That goes into more detail than my outlines typically do. (Usually I've relied on a scene plan as my outline; something that says "35% of the way through the story, this should be happening," etc.) While that type of outline worked well for a few specific projects, I've found it feels a little constraining for others that I tried to force into that format since, in a way that ended up feeling like it warped the project out of shape.

Snowflake goes into a lot more detail and requires a lot more up front, but allegedly it is supposed to make the first draft go faster. (Or so the guy who promotes it says!)

I'm hoping it will help to address some of my problems with the most recent stories I've attempted to write. I've usually come up with that rough scene-by-scene outline to work from, but then I hit some point at which I realize there's some fundamental structural thing that I want to change. Sometimes it's discovering that I'm undercutting one of my own themes; sometimes I discover that there needs to be some substantial development for a character earlier on, but providing that earlier development will completely change the way those later scenes play out, so my outline has been sunk. Often this ends up with me crapping out at that point, because pushing through on the current version would send me toward a dead end, but it feels daunting and frustrating to have to start over; I want to make it through a draft rather than continually retooling the first chunk. (And especially if it happens more than once!)

So! Maybe having more done during the outlining process will let me discover some of those structural issues or contradictions before I start the draft, rather than midway through. We will see!

Not that I have much to share.

I did select the WIP that I listed in my intro post as "Gold and Silver" to be the WIP I plan to work on first, and probably "Rescue" as the next original idea after that. (Though probably with a break in between to work on some fanfic.)

As I mentioned earlier this week, I am trying to figure out a plausible way to switch between a handful of projects at a time, so I've got some more groundwork to get through before I can really devote myself to much actual writing, but at least I'm excited to get to that point.

The current plan is:
Gold and Silver - write down as many of the initial ideas/intentions/tone as I can
Fanfic Project 1 - write down my current ideas/intentions/tone
Rescue - write down my current ideas/intentions/tone [I AM HERE]
Fanfic Project 2 - write down my current ideas/intentions/tone
Gold and Silver - do an official outline of the project
Fanfic Project 1 - do an official outline of the project
Rescue - do an official outline of the project
Gold and Silver - first draft time!
Fanfic Project 1 - first draft (of part one) time!

^ After that, those four initial projects (two original and two fanfic) should be staggered at different points of completion, giving me more options to switch between different stages of writing based on where my head is at, as well as a bit of variety in the projects themselves, which I hope will help stave off burnout on any specific project, and give me a bit of flexibility to follow my inspiration.

If some other project or idea gives me a surge of inspiration and excitement, I could always still loop a fifth project in (because I can do what I want forever), but my general intent is then to finish one thing on the list, and only then start another project.

I do have the benefit of exactly none of this being on a deadline, so I have some freedom to experiment and see if this kind of project hopping ends up working for me.