A Sketch Ain’t Worth a Thousand Words

[scribblemyname]

So I just remembered/realized why I love writing flash fiction and have such a hard time getting it to pass muster with my awesome, wonderful, incredibly stick-me-to-it beta: I write sparse. Always have; probably always will. Oh, joy.

In short, I’m one of those odd and rare writers that sketches in a story and, if I’m wise enough to not consider it done, fill it in later. This usually takes a lot of filling and it’s a pain in the butt and I’m often bored with the exercise long before the exercise is bored with me. Cue beta shipping it back to me with a note telling me to “Bake it longer, chica.” :headdesk:

This is also probably where my major problem with novel-writing is coming from, and it certainly stems from all my time mucking around in fandom where I can play off a certain set of standard assumptions. I’ll be the first to admit (in fact, I already did somewhere) that “Crossing the Barrier” could have been deepened quite a bit. I was nowhere near ready to tackle that kind of work though, didn’t have enough interest in the story left to want to, and knew that the story worked without it. So I didn’t. It probably would have been good practice.

What about you? Do you write long or short? Do you have to layer in details later or trim the fat?

Originally published at Liana Mir. You can comment here or there.

Comments

[scribblemyname]

"...honestly, I'd rather cut things (or be told to cut things from a story) than to have to go back and add them in after the fact."

Most writers are like this. It's why it makes it a pain that from the time I first tried writing at four years old, I was already doing it the opposite way.

"It's a curious phenomenon, but when I'm done with a thing, I'm done with it and I don't want to go back and revisit it too much; I lack the motivation for that so often because my brain says "done" and that's that."

I don't think it's curious at all. I'm EXACTLY like that. I just HAVE to go back, as you well know, or my beta will never be satisfied. Sometimes I catch myself wanting to crawl under the covers and whine if my disciplined muse tries to drag me back out. New story? Great! The same one a tenth time? Gah! Silly me. :shakes head at self:

I like how you let the story unroll ahead of you. It's one of my favorite ways to write. I get to know my characters by playing them out in mental stories before setting them to paper, but I've always theorized that if you have real characters in a defined premise with a defined set of world rules, everything that follows is inevitable, if thoroughly unpredictable.

I remember when I first wrote the one novel I did finish and have out to a publisher (under a different name), it constantly surprised me on how it flipped my imagined timelines around, altered relationships a bit, and played out differently but so like the story on the page. I love that kind of writing. It resonates with your original desire but surprises.

[in-the-blue.livejournal.com]

One of my favorite (although kind of annoying) things is when I go into a story knowing who the protagonist is and some low-life scumbag OTHER character steals the spotlight.

It happens pretty much all the time. Then again, no one goes through life thinking "oh, I'm a minor character." They're all the stars of their own show, at least in their minds and in their own world-view, and merit as much exploration as the darling ones do. Then again, all my stuff is intensely character-driven, rather than plot- or idea-driven, so it makes sense.

[scribblemyname]

:giggles: Well, I won't call Annie a scumbag, but I certainly didn't intend to make her the lead. Gotta love characters. They don't really care about what we minion authors desire. :grins: