5 Tips for Your NaNoWriMo Outline

305/365 - NaNoWriMo! by haley-elise

Does your NaNoWriMo outline need a little spit shine? Like your basic story but don't know if it's any good?

Piggy-backing off last year's NaNoWriMo outlining workshop, I've got a few more techniques I've accumulated to help hammer your outline into shape and give it a bit of a spit-shine.

The following tips will help you identify your main conflict, work tension and conflict into each scene, make sure your scenes flow logically toward the ending, and move your story from hook to resolution.

If you haven't taken a look at my NaNoWriMo Outlining Workshop, it might be a useful reference for the application of these techniques.

Part I - Part II - Part III

1. WRITE A 35 WORD PITCH

The third, and Adryn's favorite (and by favorite, I mean she hates me for making her do this), is to boil the conflict down to 35 words. You might remember when I described how I wrote a 35-word pitch for The Mark of Flight, which has really helped me in my quest toward publication. (More on pitches)

A pitch this short will force you to think critically about the central conflict. You can use the pitch to keep your plot from sprawling in unnecessary directions (if you tend to sprawl, like I do) and to identify whether your story has core plot-issues. Can't pitch it? That's an indication that the story's basic framework might need more work.

If, like Adryn, you have no idea where to begin boiling down the conflict, start by summarizing who your protagonist is and what they want in 35 words. Then summarize who your antagonist is and what they want in 35 words (hint: it better be something that chucks a horny, sparkly vampire in the Bed, Bath & Beyond display room of your protagonist's goal.)

Now take your protagonist and describe what she wants and how the antagonist is preventing her achieving that (of course, in 35 words).

Yeah, this is time-consuming, but it will likely save you a ton of time in revisions and give you a great framework for your query pitches!

Yes? No! image by Laura Appleyard

2. YES, BUT... / NO, AND...

Conflict in your scene uninteresting? On a recent episode of the Writing Excuses Podcast, Mary Robinette Kowal described a technique for making sure your scenes are exciting. It was intended for pantsers rather than plotters, but I think the technique is a fantastic way to make sure you're giving your scene enough conflict and tension.

Simply, get your characters into a pickle. Then ask the question, do they succeed in getting out of the situation?

If you answer YES, you must then come up with a complication.
YES, Bilbo rescues the dwarves from the Mirkwood prisons, BUT they nearly drown in the barrels.

If you answer NO, you toss in a little extra complication to really put pressure on your characters.
NO, Katniss's friends and family are not spared at reaping day AND it's her little sister who's been chosen to fight (and probably die) in The Hunger Games.

3. BUT / THEREFORE

You've note-carded and chased every plot-bunny down their respective rabbit holes, but do your scenes flow one-to-the-next in a logical, domino-effect that leads you from inciting action to inevitable conclusion?

Carrie Ryan, Magical Words blogger and author of the creeptastically beautiful Forest of Hands and Teeth, describes a technique she learned from an editor.

"If you line up every scene or plot beat in your book, and the only words that connect them are “and then,” you have a problem; instead, each scene needs to be connected with either ”therefore” or “but.”

 I'm doing this with my outline for Beggar's Twin, and it's really coming in handy. It's a bit complicated with multiple perspectives, but I'm literally setting up my notecards into the different perspectives and making sure they flow both along their individual storylines and toward the conclusion. I've found it super-helpful in identifying scenes that aren't working.


4. SEVEN-POINT STORY STRUCTURE

The fourth is the 7-Point Story Structure from Dan Wells--seven points that help you move your story from hook to resolution, which you can watch in five parts on YouTube:



According to the Writing Excuses show notes, the seven points are:

• Hook
• Plot Turn I
• Pinch I
• Midpoint
• Plot Turn II
• Pinch II
• Resolution

If you don't want to take the time to watch the YouTube video, you can also hear the cast of Writing Excuses discuss these seven points HERE.

Similar to this: The Hollywood Formula; The Three-Act Structure; The Secrets of Story Structure

5. TORTURE YOUR FRIENDS

Put down the scalpel.

Once you're finished making sure your conflict is solid, your scenes have tension, your plot chugs nicely toward the resolution, and you're hitting all the points of basic story structure, it's time to type it all up and present the outline to a friend, preferably another artistic type.

Generally, I find other writers or artists understand how to look at an embryonic story idea and help it grow. You don't want someone to give you unnecessary criticism and kill the excitement.

Don't know any other writers IRL? A great resource for other writers is the NaNoWriMo forums! Find someone to swap outlines with. And hey, if you're noticing some familiar problems, point them in the direction of whichever resource was most helpful. I don't mean my blog, though that would be awesome; I mean the primary source. If you think they'd benefit from But / Therefore, send them to Carrie's post on Magical Words.

Happy writing, and remember to eat occasionally!

NaNoWriMo Outlining Workshop Part II - Plot, Subplots, & Scenes

DID YOU MISS PART I?

Last post was focused on getting your characters, conflicts, and motivations solid. This post is all about the nitty-gritty plotty-wotty stuff. Before you start, you're going to need some supplies:

• Note-cards (preferably the lined variety, in several colors)
• Writing utensils
• A notebook (if you like to keep brainstorming materials all together)
• scratch paper (if you need to spread it out)
• your character/motivation/conflict notes from the last workshop.

THE BIG PICTURE

Using the information you’ve come up with, write a one-sentence description of your story’s main conflict that includes:

MC (Motivation) + conflict + Antagonist (Motivation) + Action + Consequences

Action in this case means the course of action your character must take in order to overcome the conflict. The consequences are, predictably, what will happen if they fail.

Don’t worry--this sentence will suck, and it’s not your back-cover summary; it’s a way to boil down the conflict between your most important characters. It will sound disgustingly vague until later in the process, when we will modify it a bit. You may find that you have to reach into a later part of the story, when your characters have a bit more information to form motivations that are more directly in opposition with the antagonists, to do this part. That's fine! Just make sure that their motivations from the beginning have a bearing on how the story plays out.

Example:

A headstrong princess who wants to be a great queen is kidnapped by a charismatic general who wants to use her against her kingdom, and she must find her way home in time to warn them of approaching war.

If you can actually boil down your character's course of action to a set of choices, the sentence will be a lot stronger. In my case, I'm certain this was the difference in my query letter between getting and not getting a request.

A headstrong princess who wants to be a great queen is kidnapped by a charismatic general who wants to use her against her kingdom, and she must make a choice: break her promise to her rescuer and rush home to prepare her kingdom for war, or risk her life to free the brave slave-boy who gave up everything to save her.

Both of those sentences sort of sound like crap, but you can see where I'm going with this--I know the major conflict between my protagonist, my antagonist, and the issues that she's going to have to resolve in order to get her happily-ever-after. I can keep this in mind as I work through the rest of the story.

SUBPLOTS & BRAINSTORMING

Now that you have the sentence for your main conflict, go back through your characters’ motivations and try to spot desires that might produce conflict. You don’t have to know anything specific yet about how that will translate into scenes, but it’s good to have in mind where characters will have tension with each other.

Once you identify possible conflicts, write down each on its own sheet of paper and start brainstorming. This is a great time to employ mind-maps, spidergraphs, or stream-of-consciousness brainstorming methods. You may find yourself adding characters and desires to the conflict sheet as you brainstorm. I recommend starting with what the characters want, what is getting in their way, and what other characters have desires that conflict or hold them back.

All of these conflicts are potential subplots. Keep them in mind through the next step of the process, especially when you start to get stuck.

NOTE-CARDING

Note-carding is a method I learned from writer and writing teacher Holly Lisle. I've touted this method before, and I highly recommend you visit Lisle's post describing note-carding and learn the method from her, but I will give a brief overview here.

Figure out roughly how long you want your novel to be. This is a fantasy blog, and since most fantasy books are roughly 100,000 words long, we’ll go with that. The average scene is 1,750 words, so divide your projected word count by your scene-length, and you’ll get a rough estimate of the number of scenes you should have in your novel--in this case 57. This isn’t a perfect estimate--just something to get you thinking in the arena of what you’ll need.

Now divvy up your scenes between narrators and start writing down every scene idea that comes to you, and try to distill it into a single sentence.

This was my outline for last year's NaNoWriMo. You can see my five character motivation cards, my scene notecards, and the little post-its with reminders of subplots and exposition info!

Now, I didn't know about the note-carding method when I wrote The Mark of Flight (and it shows), but I used it for HELLHOUND. At first, I decided I wanted to write between two narrators, so I gave 60% of the scenes to Helena (my MC) and 40% to her godfather, Eamon. Well, by about a third of the way through writing, I changed my mind and gave 100% of the scenes to Helena, which resulted in me chucking a bunch of my notecards. The beauty of it was, the notecarding method made it easy to toss those notecards, and fill them back in with the cool new stuff I'd come up with.

Notecarding is the most guilt-free, changeable form of outlining I've yet found. Don’t censor yourself, don’t worry about how a scene might or might not fit. You should end up with something like this:

“On a yacht off the Miami coast, Helena uses the distraction of the sorcerers battle with her master to break the spell holding her pack captive, and then she steals the book the sorcerers are after and escapes by swimming to shore”

It doesn't have to be that set-out. This is the first scene in the new version of the book, so I knew what needed to happen. You may end up with "set-up set-up set-up...and then something happens that I haven't figured out yet." That's fine. The process of note-carding alone might help you figure out what that "something" needs to be. If not, you'll probably come up with some ideas while writing. Make sure you’ve got about 30 notecards before you move on to the next section. If you start having trouble or getting stuck, go back to your characters' motivations and start trying to figure out how best you can get in their way. This part is FUN, but can be somewhat time-consuming, so give yourself the time you think you'll need.

If it helps, a good way to organize your scene-card is:

Setting + MC (Motivation) + Conflict + Course of Action + Cliffhanger or Resolution

You don't have to stick to that at all, but it's a short and sweet kind of way to set up what happens or needs to happen in your scene. I'll write a few more examples below from my NaNoWriMo project from last year, HELLHOUND.

"In the kitchen, Jaesung asks Helena about her fake military school and catches her in her lie, putting their trust in each other on thin ice. As he leaves, she spots the mark of the sorcerer's guild on their doorstep and realizes she's been found, and her roommates could be in danger."

"In Eamon's basement, Helena--enraged at Rodolfo's murder--fights for her right to join the hunt and take revenge, but then Morgan tells her (the enemy) found Rodolfo because of Helena's inability to lay low."

"In the blacked-out house, Helena fights the influence of the magic glyph as she sets wards, and then passes out just as the first spell pings off her protection." 

If you're having trouble at this point, try writing some stream-of-consciousness pages about what you're having trouble with. I've been known to start out entries like this with "I don't have a villain :(" or "What should the MC be doing between plot-points A and Q?"

ON TO PART III

What discoveries have you made while plotting your story? Have you ever done note-carding before? What are some of your preferred methods of creating the scenes for your story? ARE YOU HAVING FUN?

NaNoWriMo Outlining Workshop - Part I : The Groundwork

Character – Motivation- Conflict

This workshop is intended for those who already have a pretty good idea of their story, characters, and at least a vague notion of where they want their story to go. Feel free to be like "It's Magic, I ain't gotta explain shit!" at this point. That's stuff for later. If you've got a rough sketch of a scene here, a plot twist there, this is definitely going to help. Sit tight. But before you sit tight, make a pot of coffee and grab a notebook, a pack of notecards, and a pen. We're going to be doing this old-school.

This section focuses on the most important part of story: characters. It's aimed at organizing your characters on paper--their descriptions, desires, and disagreements--before you start writing your outline. You may find subplots, new twists, and new scenes springing to mind as you work through this section. Take note of them--you'll use that in part II of the workshop.

Note: Wow, y'all! I've had several thousand views on this post, so thank you! If you're enjoying this, or if it's not working for you, or if you have stuff to add, I'd love to hear from you in the comments. :)

I. CHARACTER

Write your characters’ names on separate notecards, or spread out on notebook paper—you’ll be writing quite a bit under each character’s name.

1.      Write a description of each major character (including your antagonist[1] or antagonistic force) that includes:

DECRIPTOR + NOUN

Descriptor - an adjective or adjectival phrase such as magic-weilding, willful, out-of-work.

Noun that helps you define your character, such as mercenary, werewolf, teenager.

Examples:
A. headstrong princess
B. stuttering slave
C. itinerant mage
D. charismatic general

*It is also acceptable to write NOUN who DESCRIPTIVE ACTION

Example: A girl who recently lost her job / a boy who survived the killing curse / a girl who hates her fairy-godmother.

2.      Once you have that list, try to add another descriptor you’d like the readers to discover about the character as they go through the book. You may not know this yet, and if not, you’ll probably figure it out while you’re writing. I call these “Shadow Descriptions”

Examples:
A. compassionate
B. brave
C. lonely
D. manipulative

So, throughout the story the reader will learn that the “headstrong princess” is also compassionate, the “stuttering slave” is also brave, the “itinerant mage” is also lonely, and the “charismatic general is manipulative. These traits don’t have to be surprising, but are how you might describe your characters’ personalities. These are the things you want to show your reader through your characters’ actions.

II. MOTIVATION

1.      Primary Desires

Write down what each character wants at the start of the story. Pick the most important motivation—the one thing they’re most concerned about. Try to make this more specific than “to be happy” or “to survive”. If you find yourself being too general, ask yourself questions. What would make them happy? What are they trying to survive, or is there something they are trying to survive for?

Examples:
A. To be a great queen.
B. To be in control of his own life.
C. To find the master that left him behind
D. To run a combined (and therefore peaceful) Rizellen and Centoren—his way.

Remember to note what their desires are at the BEGINNING of the story. These are usually the motivations we see right out in the open, the very first time we meet that character. You may find that your feelings about these goals change as you write, or even throughout the workshop. That’s fine!

2.      Secondary Desires

No one wants just one thing. In fact, people often want two different things that don’t go together, or that create some kind of internal conflict. Below your characters’ primary desires, write at least one more thing that character wants. I recommend you have two or three secondary desires for each character.

Examples:
A. To be seen and loved for who she is / to get home / to stop the war
B. To remain under the radar (and therefore safe) / to protect the people he cares about
C. To learn and teach magic by writing his book / to prevent war / NOT to be the only one trying to fix Rizellen’s problems
D. To be respected and revered for ending the war (by either conquering or combining) / to use the kidnapped princess as a means to get (primary desire) / to destabilize Rizellen

If your characters’ own desires conflict with one another, that’s a great source of tension, which gives you plenty of internal conflict.

            Example:

            Stuttering (but brave) slave boy wants to stay safely under the radar, but can’t because he also wants to protect those he cares about.

III. CONFLICT 

Write down next to each primary desire at least two things preventing the character from getting what he wants in the beginning chapters of your story. At least one of these should be related to your antagonist’s goals. If it’s not, you probably need to do some thinking on what makes those characters your protagonists and antagonists, and see if you can nudge them into more direct opposition.

Example:

The headstrong and compassionate princess wants to be a great queen. The things getting in her way are:

1. The council wants her cousin to be queen

2. She’s been kidnapped and can’t get home

3. She has no confidence in herself

4. She doesn’t know what her people need

The antagonist’s primary goal is to rule both of their countries, which conflicts with her goal of someday being a great queen. Further, the antagonist plans to use her against her kingdom, which also conflicts with her desire to be a great queen, as does his desire to destabilize her kingdom.

Often, the protagonist and antagonist will have something in common. In this cast, both characters want peace, but not only do they have different visions of a peaceful future, they have different ideas about the methods. These similarities and differences between your pro-and-antagonists will help you.

The main plot of your story should be rooted in this conflict of desires.

Of course, there will be much more to the story than just your main character and antagonist’s conflict, but that conflict should always have a bearing on the story—like Voldemort and Harry Potter’s conflicting desires shaped the overall narrative arc of the series (and each book) without being the most important part of every scene.

DONE? HEAD ON OVER TO PART II

Was this helpful? Did you make any discoveries? Having trouble? Let me know in the comments!

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[1] If you don’t have an antagonist, go listen to Adryn’s villain workshop and come back when you’ve got a little more idea of your bad guy or antagonistic force. Check it out on Pendragon Variety Podcast. This is VERY IMPORTANT.