Keith D Edinburgh - Writings, Photographs, Reviews

Masters of Eternity — my middle grade novel — is the first significant piece of writing I’ve done where I’ve outlined it first.

I’m finding it an enlightening experience. At first, I had fears that sticking to an outline would dampen spontaneity and creativity — in the same sort of way as a paint-by-numbers kit or a colouring-in book.

As it happens, outlining has — like doing a deal with a benevolent devil — given me the best of both worlds. The outlining itself was a creative process, one which allowed me to wrestle plot points to the ground and beat them into submission before nailing them to a mixed metaphorical mast.

Now, 20,000 words in, I’ve found the outline absolutely invaluable. I’d sketched out each sequence within each scene within each act (as per David Baboulene’s The Story Book) and am now also taking the advice of treating fleshing out each scene like penning a short story, where I already know the beginning, middle and end.

Writing the words which make up the first draft is of course resulting in surprises. Characters behaving in unpredictable ways; or minor plot points twisting back on themselves to be unrecognisable from my planned outline. This has been a revelation though — the true advantages of free-form seat-of-the-pants writing, within the welcome confines of knowing where the overall story arc is going.

So everything’s still on track — and the plot & characters now have a life of their own which is much more interesting than the vague sketchy ones I had originally envisaged for them.

And my black-and-white outlined picture is now beginning to look rather fetching in full colour — even if I am going over the lines every now and again.