Have you ever tried to write something, but found that your characters were behaving strangely, or the story wasn’t feeling exactly right? Sometimes, the story just won’t flow. It can be hard to put into words what’s wrong, but you’ll know exactly what I mean when you’ve been there. Maybe you’re trying to create a fantasy story and you find yourself struggling with the historical elements; maybe you’re trying to write a comedic piece and you find yourself struggling with the dramatic elements. Whatever it may be, there’s usually an element of the story that you feel needs some adjustment. In these cases, it can be really helpful to pull out a pen and paper and start writing down all of your ideas and scenes. This way, you can clearly see what’s going wrong without any ambiguity. It’s an effective and relatively straightforward method to improve your writing process.
Step One: Gather Your Materials
The first step is to gather your materials. This means making sure that you have all the necessary elements to write your story. Depending on what kind of story you’re writing, you may need to do some research – a lot of historical fiction stories for example would likely require a lot of research into things like clothing, weaponry, and living conditions in the late 1800s. If you’re looking for a fun, light-hearted story, then perhaps you should do some research into popular culture in the 1970s to get the flavor of the time period. Always make sure that you have enough materials to write the story. If you feel like you have enough material, then there’s no reason not to move on to the next step.
Step Two: Brainstorm Ideas
The next step is to brainstorm ideas. Ideally, you want to write a story that’s entirely unique to you and your experience as a writer. However, sometimes, this is simply not possible. If you’re looking for a story that’s already been written, then you can use one of the many templates that are out there, or you can simply find an existing plot and adapt it to fit your needs. The important thing is that you come up with a unique idea, that you feel passionately about. After you’ve finished brainstorming ideas, you can start to make a list of the various characters you come up with, and then you can start to flesh out their backstories, and the world that they live in.
Step Three: Organize Your Materials
Once you’ve got your characters and the world they live in organized, it’s time to start putting it into proper writing format. This is where your outline comes in. The outline is simply a list of all the scenes that you’ve got so far – from the very first scene to the last. It helps you to keep track of everything, and it helps you to establish a clear direction for the story. The easiest way to create an outline is to use a plotting software program, like Actuate’s PowerBook, or Scriven’s StoryMiner. These programs make creating an outline a breeze. All you need to do is set your scene order, and the program will do the rest. It will even generate a compelling narrative that draws the reader in, and makes them want to know what happens next. It really is that simple.
Step Four: Rewrite
After you’ve got your outline, it’s time to rewrite. Rewriting is a very important step because it allows you to cut out all the material that isn’t working, and replace it with new, compelling material. Sometimes, during this step, you’ll find that the material you’ve got is just too good to go through; so instead of throwing it away, you’ll want to keep it for later on. Once you’ve got this step under-way, it’s time to start thinking about how you’re going to pull off this incredible feat of writing.