To Outline or Not Outline, that is the question\u2014with apologies to the Bard himself, William Shakespeare.<\/p>\n
I first met outlining in Mrs. Watkins\u2019 sixth grade geography class. I hated it then, I hate it now. I\u2019m what people sometimes call a \u201cSeat-of-the-Pantser. In other words, I start writing a book and follow the story to see where it\u2019s going. That was as true for my first book, Until Proven Guilty<\/em>, as it is now. In other words, I had no idea Anne Corley was a goner until \u2026 well \u2026 she was. That outcome was as much of a surprise to me as it was to my readers.<\/p>\n Early on in my writing career, another area writer, someone who wrote fantasy, and I ended up appearing at the same events. He was an outliner; I was not. The two of us often debated the pros and cons of outlining in public. We were contemporaries. At the time he was much more well known than I was, but over the years I lost track of him because, with the exception of the Harry Potter books, I\u2019m not all that keen on fantasy. At this point I have no idea if he\u2019s still writing. However, at age 82, not only am I still writing, I recently signed a contract to deliver two more books. I\u2019ll be fully employed until I hit 85!<\/p>\n What brought all this up today? I recently heard from a reader who had just finished reading The Girl From Devil\u2019s Lake<\/em>. He wanted to know why Marliss ends up dying at the end of the book and wondered if I had just run out of material for her character. The answer to that is, \u201cNo, I hadn\u2019t run out of material.\u201d Marliss had inserted herself in the investigation from the outset. Although she was incredibly annoying, she was also smart. In the end, she got too close to finding the bad guy and suffered the inevitable consequences.<\/p>\n Did I know it was coming before it happened? No, I did not. I may be the writer, but the truth is, as far as the stories are concerned, I\u2019m just along for the ride along with all my readers.<\/p>\n So today\u2019s blog will be short but sweet. As of yesterday I crossed the halfway point in Unnamed Joanna #22. I\u2019m not sure how it\u2019ll end, but I do know what\u2019s in the next two chapters, and I need to get after them.<\/p>\n By the way, I know there were some challenges with last week\u2019s post. It went out earlier than it was supposed to, and, in that version, it wasn\u2019t possible to access the comments. If that happens again, please visit my website, jajanceauthor.com<\/a> and click on the word blog in the upper right hand corner of the page. If you bookmark that address and your copy doesn\u2019t come through in the future, you\u2019ll be able to get right back to it.<\/p>\n Now it\u2019s time to make breakfast and then get my nose to the writing grindstone. As Evie Busk would say, \u201cIf it is to be it is up to me.\u201d\u2014outline or no outline.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" To Outline or Not Outline, that is the question\u2014with apologies to the Bard himself, William Shakespeare. I first met outlining in Mrs. Watkins\u2019 sixth grade geography class. I hated it then, I hate it now. I\u2019m what people sometimes call a \u201cSeat-of-the-Pantser. In other words, I start writing a book and follow the story to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3475","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-writing"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t