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Say what you will about Episodes VIII, IX, and X. I highly enjoyed them if for no other reason than the sheer insanity of the story. It was like watching a live-action cartoon in its ambition. Some things worked, some didn't. But one thing that still strikes me is the audacity of Rian Johnson's writing.
SPOILERS AHEAD: Keeping in mind what came before and that Johnson would only helm one film in the series, The Last Jedi contains some of the most aggressive storytelling I've ever encountered. First, Leia is given an insane new force power to move through space for the sole purpose of saving her own life (and putting the next crew in the precarious position of figuring out what to do with the late Carrie Fisher's role). Then we find out that Rey's parents, the mysterious identities of whom had so far been built up as an integral part of the story, were nobodies. I actually laughed when Snoke was dispatched, at how sudden and unceremoniously such a seemingly significant character was killed off. Narratively speaking, nearly everything that had been built up in The Force Awakens was torn down. Don't get me wrong, I had a good time with TLJ, and I love that the people working on it had the guts to pursue such bonkers ideas. But taken together, I can't help but come to the conclusion that Johnson was purposely boxing the next writers into a corner, daring them to figure out a way to put the world's broken pieces back together.
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For the longest time, I was averse to any serious outlining. It seemed like a lot of unnecessary work, equivalent to actually writing the book or doing the report or whatever. I don't want to throw anyone under the bus, but I lay most of the blame with my early English teachers. What I was taught consisted of an indecipherable chart of branching circles and squares. There was supposedly some logic to the jumble of ideas that my snot-nosed peers seemed to have little trouble grasping, but to me it just looked like the mad organizings of an accountant. When I got serious about writing novels, I immediately realized I had to find a more tolerable way to accomplish this early-stage grunt work, and out of desperation I came up with a system that I think simplifies, and perhaps demystifies, the whole process.
Instead of bubbles and squares, I open a blank Excel file, and in one or two sentences, I type any chapter ideas I already have into separate cells in the first column. This way I get a visual of the structure of the book and can easily rearrange chapters. I find that once I have a few figured out, the rest start filling themselves in, either from inspiration or narrative necessity. When I'm done, I have a couple sentences detailing every plot element that needs to be in each chapter of the first "part" (third, quarter, or however I'm structuring it). I list character details and stray ideas below, but I leave most of the subsequent parts blank to begin with so that the story has room to roam. This gives me some direction but leaves me free to explore the details as I go. It's just one particular way of doing things, which happens to work for me. I think it's a quick and easy way to get started and stay organized, but the point is that you should do things in the way that is going to make it easiest for you to get from the first word to the last, whatever that may be. It’s been another long, long journey full of highs and Loises, but over the course of a little more than six hallucinatory months, I’ve finished the first draft of book two. To give some perspective for anyone out there struggling to write, that’s an average of about 750 words per workday. On my best days, I got out about 1500 words and on my worst about 100.
I feel some relief having the most difficult portion completed, but even as I approached the end of this draft, multiple books in, I still felt anxiety sitting down to a blank page. It’s scary not knowing where you’re going next, but it’s also the place where a lot of the best ideas are found. There were many days that were agonizing, as I was unable to get into the right headspace. But almost without exception, after four hours trying to crack one paragraph, something would snap, and the words would start to flow. Part of what makes writing so hard is the incremental progress. It requires a certain degree of faith that your small daily effort will yield something worthy of all that accumulated time and struggle. One thing that helps is to remind myself that those six months are going to pass whether I put the work in or not, and the idea of not having taken full advantage of the time I have available to do the thing I really want to be doing scares the space hell out of me. I guess what I’m saying is, be afraid, be very afraid. But use that fear to propel rather than paralyze you. I’m going to work to update this page more regularly now that a little bit of the pressure is off. So, if you’re interested in the writing process, check back soon for more posts delving into the re-writing, editing, and self-publishing processes. |
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