{"id":2789,"date":"2015-03-06T08:47:54","date_gmt":"2015-03-06T13:47:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.skelleyverse.com\/?p=2789"},"modified":"2015-03-01T12:49:33","modified_gmt":"2015-03-01T17:49:33","slug":"tightening-up-the-geese","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/tightening-up-the-geese\/","title":{"rendered":"Tightening Up The Geese"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/06\/r-avatar.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-41\" src=\"http:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/06\/r-avatar.png\" alt=\"r-avatar\" width=\"81\" height=\"81\" \/><\/a>Our outline is coming into shape. We know the overall structure and we have a reasonable idea of the way everything begins and ends. Of course, the vast majority\u00a0of the details are still loosey-goosey.<\/p>\n<p>That&#8217;s a problem, sometimes. So, <a title=\"Undisclosed Locations\" href=\"http:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/undisclosed-locations\/\">as mentioned in the previous post<\/a>, we occasionally delve into fairly granular levels of detail while working on an outline, even though things can&#8217;t be carved in stone yet. We need to manage the looseness of the gooses\u00a0because there&#8217;s a compounding effect to the uncertainty in each scene. &#8220;Not sure how this one ends,&#8221; becomes,\u00a0&#8220;or how the next one starts.&#8221;\u00a0Leaving everything vague in your outline leaves you with only the mirage of an outline. It won&#8217;t have enough structure to serve as a useful guide when you start writing, and you&#8217;ll be pantsing it despite all the time you spent supposedly outlining.<\/p>\n<p>So, on a shelf in the same closet where you keep your <a title=\"Weasel Stomping Boots\" href=\"http:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/weasel-stomping-boots\/\">weasel-stomping boots<\/a>, you should have a goose-wrench. But whereas those boots are made for stompin&#8217; &#8212; no weasels when you&#8217;re done &#8212; the wrench should be applied selectively, and judiciously. Having some loosey-goosey areas is\u00a0desirable; you just don&#8217;t want the entire outline flopping around.\u00a0Identify\u00a0the points through which your story\u00a0<em>must<\/em> pass, and crank them down just tight enough so they don&#8217;t shift (although the rest of the tale can still\u00a0pivot around them).<\/p>\n<p>Naturally, this is yet another activity made easier by working with the right partner. Active discussion is an excellent way to figure out which story beats need the wrench, and how tightly to pin them down.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Our outline is coming into shape. We know the overall structure and we have a reasonable idea of the way everything begins and ends. Of course, the vast majority\u00a0of the details are still loosey-goosey. That&#8217;s a problem, sometimes. So, as mentioned in the previous post, we occasionally delve into fairly granular levels of detail while [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[323,326],"tags":[290],"class_list":["post-2789","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-plotting-outlines","category-writing-as-a-team","tag-son-of-music-novel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2789","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2789"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2789\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2792,"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2789\/revisions\/2792"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2789"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/runeskelley.com\/skelleyverse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}