Weekly Check-In

[sineala.livejournal.com]

Hi writers! Hi artists! How's it going this week? Anything interesting to report about your stories?

Here's something I've been wondering about, if anyone would like to have a discussion: do unexpected things happen in your stories?

I know that I can often start out with a scene planned out in my head (say, characters exchange a few angry words and someone storms out), and I have the exact idea of how to start it, and how to end it, and everything that happens in between, and yet when I actually sit down to write it I find as I am writing that, much to my surprise, Bodie has punched someone in the face in the middle of the argument. Which was not in the plan.

Does this sort of thing happen to you when you write? What do you do? Do you go with the flow? Or do you edit and stick to your original plans? Or does it not happen at all?

Comments

[dawnebeth.livejournal.com]

LOL! My whole writing style is vague planning of the beginning and sort of the end with large sections where I don't know WTF is happening until it does. I nearly always go with the flow and then sit back. Is this plausible? Does take us to a place we need to be? How can I make it jibe with what came before? I generally go back and tweak this or that slightly and voila! The characters have spoken and they are right ninety-nine percent of the time.

This also goes for naming my original characters--I'll think up some OC for a scene and a name will pop into my head, and sometimes a description, too. If, for whatever reason, I don't like that name--too bad, no matter how hard I try to rename the character, he/she will refuse to acknowledge my version and force me to write the original name!

I'm just insanely lucky that any of my stories make any sense at all with this laissez-faire writing style!

As for my current story, wrote this morning, doing very well--Bodie and Doyle were chastised by Cowley. Smirk--no wee drams for them today. Over 28,000 words and I *think* I know where it's going next. ('course, I could be wrong.)

[liriel1810.livejournal.com]

Vague planning is a good way to go because it gives you room to be flexible when your characters pop their head up and decide to go off in a different direction. I agree, when the characters speak and tell you about something you didn't have planned for the story, it almost always works better than what you'd originally intended.

I wish my OCs would name themselves! I struggle so much trying to name them sometimes.

Poor lads getting a dressing down rather than a wee dram. *g* Go you! That's fantastic that you're already at 28K!

[sc-fossil.livejournal.com]

I usually use my postal customers' names for my OCs (or some variation). If it's a name requiring a certain country or nationality, I google the most popular names for that country and/or region and pick one from there.

[dawnebeth.livejournal.com]

Oh, me, too--I've googled 'names from whatever country" a lot for this current story, as a matter of fact, although the main OC name came from a book.

[golden-bastet.livejournal.com]

I found out yesterday how to increase word count: SEX SCENES. Who needs outline / plot???

Actually (and more seriously), the story really started from Doyle's POV. Bodie was always meant to be there, and what started as Evil!Cowley morphed into an OC (though Cowley's in there as well). But Doyle is still pretty much the heart of the story.

HOWEVER... one day, when I was thinking about how to introduce Bodie, things - THINGS!, I say - started going off in all sorts of directions. There are four basic scenes during which their relationship develops (and there's a lot of refreshment-retrieving happening to get them alone, LOL), but Bodie's getting his own special time. And then there's the characterizations; as I mentioned (well, somewhere): they started as pretty nice guys, and now they're Rent!Boy and Bastard. And Bastard started with the sex w/o Rent!Boy - though they'll make up for that, LOL.

Beyond the four basic scenes, NONE of this was in the original draft.

Man, this story is *all* over the map.

[liriel1810.livejournal.com]

It sure sounds like your story is developing in an interesting direction! I'm sure you'll be able to pull it all together into a cohesive whole.

[liriel1810.livejournal.com]

I actually have real progress to report this week! I'm now officially 1/4 done my rough draft. *g* The plan is to be half done by the end of this weekend.

My characters are always trying to take over! Sometimes it works to let them, and sometimes I have to bop them over the head with my cricket bat and tell them to behave.

I think it's a good sign when your characters want to stick their two cents worth in. To me that means you've succeeded in making them live.

[golden-bastet.livejournal.com]

I'm now officially 1/4 done my rough draft.

Congrats! \o/ !!!!

and I'm officially jealous - there's no way I'd be able to write 5,000 in a weekend.

I think it's a good sign when your characters want to stick their two cents worth in. To me that means you've succeeded in making them live.

I agree. If they're cohesive enough to take over, then something's definitely gone right.

[liriel1810.livejournal.com]

I'm very fortunate to have a hubby who does 99% of the cooking and all the housework (he's not working at the moment and I am). It also helps that my weekend is always a three day weekend because I only work part-time. ;)

[msmoat.livejournal.com]

I usually write with a fair to good idea of where I'm going, sometimes with a very detailed plot/character line. But yes, the characters will sometimes lead me in ways I didn't expect or intend, even so. Depending on how radical the turn is, I will think it through--is this the story I intended to write? If not, then am I willing to abandon that idea and go with the new story and all its implications? I have pulled characters back to my original intention; I've also gone with the flow. It all depends!

I also find that banter/dialogue is part of the reason for all of this. I can't plan banter or dialogue, just scenes. (Well, I will think of some lines ahead of time, perhaps, and usually how the conversation starts.) But to get the flow of speech, it has to happen as I write. That's where a lot of new stuff will come up. Yesterday I was writing--ahem, not on the BB--and found that the lads were taking the conversation into deeper waters than I really wanted to go into in that scene. In the end, we compromised, keeping some of the serious undertones, but not acknowledging them, and steering the conversation into humour instead. After I write the final scene today, I'll go back and see how it all flows in terms of tone and sense and story.

Err...long-winded way of saying: yes! It happens often! To different degrees! *g*

As for the BB...um...I need to get serious about that! The plan is to do so this weekend!

[inlovewithboth.livejournal.com]

I'm done and dusted *reaches for cuppa tea and another doughnut* Which worries me somewhat - is it going to be enough?!! My main problems really are my own insecurities about writing a story that's good enough for such illustrious company.

Oh, and if unexpected things happen in my stories, I just go with it. I rarely plan in detail, so like to bounce around a bit. *boing*

[scherwood]

*snicker*

Sounds like you explained my way of writing. *g*
I change things all the time, until I like what I write, and if things don't fit I erase them without saving them (otherwise they would be too much of a distraction). LOL

The most strange thing so far in my fic is the time frame, *groan* all of a sudden I got the time frame wrong and with a LOT of help from my sister we managed to figure it all out, but it was a close call. I mean, how the piiip can it go so wrong while writin!! *g*

[banbury.livejournal.com]

Ha! It's my writing style :-) I usually have an idea of what I want to write about and some kind of plot. Sometimes I even know the last sentence ;-), but anything else up to my characters, they like to spring a surprise on me %-0

[sc-fossil.livejournal.com]

I admit I often have no idea where the story is going. Usually if I try to go one way, one or both of the lads takes over and decides that it's not the proper thing. I let them have their heads. I have to hear and see them to write. If I don't, then I can't force it.

I'm at 50,000 words on my first hardcore rewrite. It should top out at 60,000 unless the lads snog again. Right now, they're not in the mood.