A Writer's Tale

On Outlines

WHEN I WAS IN SCHOOL, AN OUTLINE HAD A VERY SPECIFIC STRUCTURE. It looked something like this:

I. Topic Heading

A. a subdivision of the heading.

1. a subdivision of A.

2. and another.

a. with a couple of subdivisions

b. of its own.

1) and then you can go here

2) with further subdivisions

a) and then here

b) which gets a little crazy.

B. But if you have an A, you must have at least a B. It can have a host of subdivisions, too.

II. And you must have a II, or there was no point in having a I.

III. And on and on it goes.

This used to be what people meant by an “outline.” Among writers, agents and editors, however, an outline is something different.

It is a synopsis a brief version of your story. An “outline,” or synopsis, might be written for your own use as a blueprint for your novel or as a selling device.

I’ve got comments about both.

When embarking on a novel, should you start by creating an outline so you’ll have your route mapped out before you start the actual writing?

It’s debatable.

I recommend against it. In my own opinion, doing an outline is risky business.

1. There’s a good chance that you’ll “shoot your wad” on the outline. When you get around to writing the novel itself, you might find that you aren’t terribly excited about it. You feel as if you’ve already travelled this route and seen the sights before. So instead of writing the novel with a lot of creative energy, you may find yourself lukewarm about the thing. There’s not much excitement in following an outline, fleshing it out, padding it.

Your lack of enthusiasm will almost certainly show in the finished product. Your novel will probably have a “painted by the numbers” quality.

2. When writing an outline, you are building your novel on a superficial structure of logic. Tins leads to this leads to this leads to this, with all the causal elements carefully thought out.

Which should make for a novel in which everything ties together very nicely. This might be a great way to operate if you’re building a house. But you’re not an architect you’re Dr. Frankenstein trying to create life. Your novel doesn’t need a blueprint, it needs lightning.

3. Even if you are able to breathe life into your carefully outlined novel, its plot will almost certainly be predictable. By the act of outlining, you have not allowed the story to grow naturally out of itself. Instead, you’ve developed it by imposing a step by step logic on the events. You think, “Well, this needs to happen next. And it should lead to this.”

The problem is, most readers will already be familiar with the logical routine, so they’re not only with you, they’re one step ahead of you. Even a carefully calculated surprise, or “twist,” isn’t likely to come off very well if you’ve previously worked it all out, detail by detail, in your outline. If you want to surprise your readers, you need to surprise yourself.

A character has to surprise you, the writer, by doing something you never expected.

Or an incident needs to pop out of nowhere and screw things up.

If you outline, you’re pretty much shooting down your chances of spontaneity.

My advice is this. After you’ve come up with an idea for your novel, tinker around with it for an hour or two. Make some notes to yourself until you have a general idea about where you want to go with it.

Then start writing.

As Hemingway said, “Write one true sentence.” And then follow it with another.

Build your book one sentence at a time, meet the characters, get to know them, and let them lead the way. See where they want to take you. Play along. Let one event lead logically to another, but if something wild wants to happen, let it.

Learn by going.

An editor once told me that my plots seem very “haphazard,” as if I never know what is supposed to happen next. He meant it as a criticism. But I think it’s a quality that has contributed to whatever success I’ve had.

Readers often tell me, “I never know what’s going to happen next.”

They mean it as a high compliment.

And it means I’m achieving one of the desired effects. I want to keep them guessing and reading.

I accomplish it by not outlining.

Most of the really good writers I know do not work from outlines. They make up their novels as they go along, and hope for the best.

It may seem like a dangerous route. Like setting off on a long driving trip without a map.

No telling what might happen or where you might end up!

Exactly.

A trip without a map makes for an exciting trip.

And you do end up getting where you’re going.

It might not be where you’d intended to go. But it might be a better place.

When you do take the mapless trip, you’ll discover something very odd and amazing.

Magic happens.

Somehow, the bits and pieces of story and character and theme and setting end up fitting together in unexpected, often wonderful ways. Ways you never could’ve planned.

Almost as if an actual story is out there someplace already created by someone else and you’ve somehow tapped into it.

So don’t worry about “getting lost” without an outline or “painting yourself into a corner.”

Just start writing, head things in the right general direction and see what happens.

Let the destination take care of itself.

And if you do get lost first make sure you’re not off on a detour that might take you somewhere interesting. If it’s leading you to a dead end or some other place you definitely don’t want to visit, just backtrack to where you took the wrong turn. Go in a new direction. Your trip isn’t “chipped in tablets,” it’s on an electronic screen or on paper.

Making changes is usually a simple matter.

Take chances.

Take the roads not taken.

You can always revise.

The best time to write an outline of your novel is afterward.

Your agent may want one. Editors may want one.

So throw it together after you’ve finished writing the novel. That way, it can’t hurt you.

If you write the outline before you’re done with the book, you’re asking not only for the damages I’ve described above, but you’re inviting various external disasters.

Some agents like to sell novels on the basis of proposals.

That is, they’ll shop around your outline, along with a few sample chapters. (This can’t usually be done until after a couple of your novels has been sold.) In theory, your new novel might consist of thirty pages twenty pages of sample chapters and a ten page outline of the rest. You don’t actually have to write an entire book unless a publisher buys it in advance.

Sounds great.

In the time it might take you to write a whole novel, you could probably write twenty proposals. One of them is sure to hit.

But there’re always buts…

1. For obvious reasons, it’s much better to have one completed novel than any number of proposals.

2. If your agent does sell one of your proposals, you will most likely receive a smaller advance than if he’d sold them the same novel after it was complete.

3. If the proposal sells, you suddenly become obligated to write the actual novel. And you might find out, much to your surprise and alarm, that you’re not able to write it. Maybe the topic is over your head. Maybe certain elements of the story, when fleshed out, don’t work the way they’re supposed to.

Until you’ve written all or most of a novel, you can never be absolutely sure it’ll fly. You don’t want to sell it in advance, only to find out too late that your story has no wings.

4. If your unfinished novel is sold on the basis of a proposal, the door is wide open for… EDITORIAL INTERFERENCE.

There is little excuse for editorial interference when the publisher has bought your completed book. If they want you to make significant changes, Why the hell did they buy the book in the first place?

If they’ve bought it on the basis of a proposal, however, anything goes.

Most likely, you’ll hear from your editor. He will have a few “suggestions” about “fine tuning” your concept. He’ll have reservations about how you propose to handle certain characters, scenes, plot-lines. He’ll have ideas for how to give it more “mainstream appeal.”

The suggestions will be ripe with common sense.

“He’s an old man, but he’s not stupid. Don’t you think, when he realizes the fish is towing him out to sea, that he’d cut the line?”

“Supernatural stuff doesn’t sell nearly as well as suspense. So why don’t you dump the ghost stuff. How about having three different serial killers drop into Scrooge’s bedroom?”

“He just turns into a cockroach? No, no, no. You need to explain why. Maybe he was involved in a science experiment that went awry. DNA is big, these days. Maybe you can explain it with DNA.”

“Now, this is just an idea. Let me run it up the flagpole, okay? If you don’t want to salute, fine, but…why not play up the gay aspect? The real reason Huck and Jim take the raft together… ”

And so it might go if you sell your novel on the basis of an outline and sample chapters.

Most editors wish they were writers. They will try to satisfy their frustrated creative urges on the back of your novel.

If they get their hands on a proposal instead of a finished novel, they drool. You’re handing them a chance to pretend they are writers. They now get to participate in the creation of your novel.

If you don’t go along with their “suggestions,” they are in a position to wreck you. Aside from pouting and complaining, they might refuse to accept your finished manuscript.

They can easily ruin any future you might’ve had with their employer.

They can even sabotage you with other publishers. In other words, you’d better go along with the editor’s suggestions or else.

Most editorial interference, however, can be avoided simply by selling your novel on the basis of itself, not on the basis of sample chapters and an outline.

Why outline your novel at all?

If you ask me, don’t do it unless your story is so complex that you need an outline just to coordinate the logistics of it.