Plots, Pants, Plants

 The more I've learned of writing, the less organized I've become, and for that, I'm grateful.

When I first started writing, I didn't have any direction beyond don't let the inner critic get you down (sound advice) but I still had no idea to how to structure anything longer than an essay, or more enduring than a joke. My first attempt at writing anything of length was a mercifully-forgotten adventure story, with a cast of around a half dozen irregular, quirky characters who would move around within the irregular, quirky plot. I had an idea of a Rashomon-style retelling of the story, within the framing device of a court case, told in flashbacks that would "dissolve" to the story as it happened. It was... ambitious. And I had a plot, of sorts, and an objective, of a kind, but what I lacked was experience, guidance, and notably: deep characters. I don't mean deep as in thoughtful or introspective, but deep as in "not thin or shallow." There were some basic concepts for each one, their defining characteristics, and what role they were to play. It was all hastily planned, but I was sure I could get through the challenge finish in thirty days, no problem.

Almost immediately, there were problems.

First, I had mapped out the Dramatic High Points of the story, but had no sense of how to move from one to the other. I wasn't quite skilled enough to write bridge scenes yet, and scared of leaping off that high board into the unplotted unknown, my characters spent most of their time in dialogue, or moving around the room, or talking while moving around the room. They didn't do much of anything, and didn't seem too distressed about it. At first, it was exciting: I thought I'd run out of material, but here I am, day three, and we're still in the drawing room talking about the adventure! And soon after, it was dreadful: great gods, three days in the drawing room and nobody has even packed to leave yet. Inaction and dithering were the first to come roost in that story.

Once I did manage to evict everyone from whatever scene they were squatting in, I hit my next major obstacle. Characters don't do what you need them to do, and in fact, appear to do whatever they want to do. This was beyond alarming. You there! You're supposed to be the love interest! Why are you nattering on about topiary? It felt like a revolt and a failing, and I wasn't mature enough to realize that this was impatience: my own Muse's way of knocking hard on the door and declaring she was bored, bored, bored. These were people--sort of--and they had needs and interests and desires and dreams, and none of those were being met if I was so eager to shove them on an ocean liner instead of listening to them. Rebellious characters, I now know, are not only the norm, but a sign that The Magic has landed. I don't know what you call it, but I think of it as The Magic, when the act of writing feels less like trying to squeeze juice from my too-dry brain and more like chasing after a stampede. When the characters take over, pay attention!

The final part of this lesson, and the one I've only recently embraced, is write the good parts in whatever order they come in. I'm still struggling with this, feeling that I need to write in chronological- or reading-order instead of order-of-scenes-that-interest-me. I am trying to think of it like building a suspension bridge. Engineers don't throw up a tower on one side, start hanging cables across, and then put up the second tower. It's supports first, and then get the middle in place, and tighten it up, and adjust the tension, and smooth it out. Only the historically-minded will care which tower went up first, and only true wonks will care if you needed a temporary rope suspension in place before the final cabling. Write the good parts is permission to jump around, writing the messy confrontation, the secret treasure, the shotgun wedding, the alien invasion. Big moments or key moments reveal character, and character is the whole story.

So, I started out as a strict plotter, story above all, and a chronological plotter at that, like following a recipe. Characters were not particularly interesting, but they served my purpose. And it was fine. This was the origin of One Last Quest, which is on the desk for a second edition and major rewrite.

Then, I tried "pantsing" with more robust characters and no clear sense of story. Flesh out the characters in depth, drop them in the Good Parts, and see what emerges. The Real JoyG began that way, as largely disconnected scenes that slowly revealed a story, though requiring a lot of fitting and adjustment to get together.

I'm at my best now, I think, as the mix, the "plantser" but from the opposite direction as the way I started. First, get the characters some depth, some goals, some dreams. Then, smoosh them together and see what they say and do. Take copious notes, and scheme for ways to help them grow (or not) and get in one another's way (for certain.) Finally, map out a story outline and drop in the suspension tower scenes, to span the gap from once upon a time to the end. Trouble in the end became that, after two chronological half-drafts, and a third draft/total rewrite after I realized what the characters truly wanted. It's no coincidence that I feel strongest about that book. The characters ring truer, and the story evolves and grew from them.

Each development I've had on the writing journey has come with the sacrifice of burning off conventions, of story order, of dependence on structure, on the desire for plot. I love it when characters rattle around the drawing room, because it might just tell me what they really wanted after all, and that I am building the bridge in the wrong place entirely. It's only taken about twenty years to hear it, but now, at last, I'm listening to the plants.