Sitting in a meeting this afternoon, I got a great idea for a story, and it immediately caught fire with me. When I got back to my office, I jotted down the idea so I wouldn’t forget. I even have a working title, “The Graveyard Shift”. So enthusiastic am I about this story, that I decided to hold off on writing “If By Reason of Strength…” so that I could work on this story instead. I have rarely, if ever, done a detailed outline for a story I’ve written. Usually, I think up a problem and solution (so I have something to work toward) and go from there. Tonight, however, I just finished writing a 2,800 word ”outline” of the story. It covers the whole story beginning to end. I won’t say much about it other than that it is a murder mystery that takes place a few thousand years in the future, in a very cool (and complex) social environment.
I’ll probably start the actual writing of it tomorow evening. With a detailed outline to work from, I don’t think it will take too long to write the story, although it could end up being longer (in terms of words) than any story I’ve written in a while. What with the outline being nearly 3,000 words, I could easily see this story at 12-15,000 words long. But it’s got good pacing and lots of characters (which is unusual for me–my stories typically deal with 2 or 3 main characters. This story has 5 or 6.)
Best of all, I’m really excited about it, which always makes it fun to write. It will be a good experiment to see how much the outline helps the writing process, and the quality of the story.
Now I’m packing my lunch and then off to bed.
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