a question for writers

[cellio]

This question is directed toward two groups: people who have completed fiction works, and people doing NaNoWriMo (national novel-writing month).

How do you structure your writing? Do you write your story linearly from beginning to end (not counting editing passes)? Or do you jump around, leaving place-holders for things you'll fill in later?

My impression, based on only a few data points, is that people doing NaNoWriMo tend to start at the beginning and write the story in order. (NaNoWriMo is all about cranking out the initial draft in a short period of time, so editing is discouraged.) I write fiction rarely and as a hobby only, but I've found that I tend to jump around somewhat -- I may start out writing linearly, but then I'll insert something like "[wild night in bar goes here]" so I can write the next part, because I'm not feeling inspired to write about wild nights right now but I do have inspiration for the aftermath. Do people who write fiction more seriously do that, or am I just quirky?

I find myself wondering whether NaNoWriMo builds productive habits, encourages destructive habits, or is just plain orthogonal to conventional writing.

Comments

[ohiblather.livejournal.com]

In my experienced, I've found that published fiction writers vary widely in their approach. Some outline in great detail before they start to write. Others only have the vaguest notion of what they want to write about, hate the idea of outlining in detail. Both methods seem to work.

I find I need some kind of outline, but don't like too much detail. I do like detailed character and background outlines, though.

I found Nanowrimo useful in forcing myself to get over my tendency to over-edit as I go. Also showed me that I COULD produce more words per day than I thought I was able to. Overall, I'm glad I did Nano, but would probably not do it too often unless I needed that kick in the pants again.

I'm currently editing the Nano novel I wrote a couple years ago for submission to my agent. I like the story a lot, but it was in REALLY rough shape and the edit turned out to be more of a rewrite.