Ganked from loweko.

[shirenomad]

Ask me one question - any one - about my writing, then post this in your LJ so I can satisfy my curiosity about yours, not that you haven't already...

Those who have never written a creative word in their life may feel free to skip the second step, though I think this meme works best as a way for authors to exchange tips.

Comments

Re: Since you mentioned writing tips...

[shirenomad]

I never brainstorm the initial event that starts the plot. Those are always things that just come to me (frequently from an underdeveloped point of the previous fic or RP session). Once I have the concept, though, developing the details generally consists of asking myself:

1) What characters will become involved, given the event?
2) How will each character react to this first event?
3) Given that, where can the characters end up at the end, realistically? Where do I want them to end up?

For each character in Question 1, I pick one answer to Question 2 and a few possible answers to Question 3. Then I start coming up with a list of events that I think naturally follow from each other, continually asking Question 2 for each character given the next event, while trying to aim everyone toward one of the answers to Question 3. Sometimes it turns out a character can't hit ANY of the final destinations I originally had in mind, but I try to work with it; better the answers to Question 2 be realistic.

Once I have the flow of events in mind, I start writing whatever scene inspires me at the moment. I don't have to take them in order, because I've already got my flowchart and I know, roughly, what happened before. (I never lock all the events in stone, but they rarely get so far from my original plan that a later scene needs to be rewritten.)

Writing a particular scene, for me, tends to be flow of consciousness, especially for dialogue. Okay, Teep just said that. How's CMZ most likely to respond? (This gets easier the longer I write, as I get more into the heads of the characters.) Again, although I'm aiming the scene toward a particular destination, I do it as subtly as possible; better they stay completely in character, and if it takes them ten pages to get where I need them to go, so be it. (Though more likely, I need to think whether the flow to the next scene is as natural as I thought it was.)