I wrote my first 2000 words yesterday, flying my way through the first chapter. The good news is that the writing was easy. The bad news is that, if i go through my outline at this rate, I will be done in 16,000 words, which is 34,000 words short of a win.
It might be time to start pantsing.
To explain (and review for my longer-time readers), there are three modes of writing:
- Planning, which means writing with a meticulous outline;
- Pantsing, which means flying by the seat of your pants;
- Plantsing, which is somewhere in-between.
I think I’ve said in these pages before that I’m a plantser, which for me means having an outline with enough leeway to fill in the blanks. But it’s not working this time — perhaps I didn’t put in enough of an outline, or I wasn’t as sure about the action. So I will be pantsing a bit.
What encourages me is that the more I write, the more the layers of the characters reveal themselves to me. These characters need to be complex, because the story will demand that my characters grow and develop — and become the spirit of Christmas.
Words Like Me 