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Sanderson style outlining in Curio
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Posted by Amontillado
Aug 19, 2023 at 04:15 PM
Brandon Sanderson advocates outlining each plot thread separately, then moving the entries from each thread outline into a master outline. Or, at least that what the Yarn Ray YouTube channel suggests - https://youtu.be/aBhT9GVh0vQ
This morning I’m experimenting with that in Curio.
You can copy a single entry in an outline (a list) as a synced instance to another list. Or, as a node in a mind map, a standalone note, an entry in a kanban stack, or probably into other contexts.
The advantage is that the separate plot thread outlines remain unchanged as you populate the master outline with synced instances of plot thread entries. Anything with impact in more than one plot thread can be copied as a synced entry across the thread outlines.
Also, when you edit any instance of those synced entries, all instances reflect the edit including the attached note field.
This seems to have possibilities.
Posted by satis
Aug 20, 2023 at 02:06 AM
Put ten writers in a room and don’t be surprised if you get 10 different recommendations. Probably more, since individual processes can change over time.
I don’t think Sanderson’s recommendation could ever work for my fiction.
I don’t outline each plot thread separately because everything starts too tentatively. Plot threads are at least partly dependent on other plot elements, or other character actions in a timeline - actions which might change as I think about story or as previously unforeseen circumstances or dialogue arise. And when that happens it changes other plot threads.
If I were to use Sanderson’s system as described I worry I’d be less willing to make changes, less willing to speculate and play, because I’d internally balk at having to change all the other relevant plot threads (unless I duplicated everything and used revision drafts of outlines) - and knowing that it might be a wrong decision and need to be reversed. I don’t mind rewriting in a word processor (which does versioning), but my outlines are speculative conglomerations broken don by Act, which makes it easier to conjecture and facilitate changes which end up on an index card storyboard.
(I’ve tried to storyboard electronically but it does not work for me. There is just *something* about being able to stare a couple of feet away at index cards on a wall color-coded with Post-It Notes by character, separated down by Act, and see everything as a whole. Although digital index cards and storyboards proliferate they hold too little text l and I can’t take in story the same way.)
I do write out separate tentative plot threads, but in OmniOutliner with tons of branching speculative subnodes (and tons of notes and draft text) containing ideas to be massaged later in a text editor. I freewrite within outline form. My outlines typically contain many dozens of pages of draft story ideas, dialogue and draft text because it’s so easy to do in the app. Mind map apps aren’t good writing/editing environments, and when I’m brainstorming and outlining I don’t like to switch between multiple apps.
I have no idea who that YouTube creator is, or how accurate his enthusiastic explication of Sanderson’s outlining method is, but Sanderson does write about his method on his site and it seems more straightforward than the video.
https://faq.brandonsanderson.com/knowledge-base/can-you-go-into-depth-about-outlining/
Posted by Amontillado
Aug 20, 2023 at 02:45 AM
I like Sanderson’s comments in that link you posted about multi-drafters and single-drafters.
Harvard outline generally take the life out of stories, or so they do for me. However, a basically flat outline (or a wall of index cards) seems like a good idea if it serves to speed-write the story.
Posted by satis
Aug 20, 2023 at 02:53 AM
Oh, I never speed write anything!
Posted by Dormouse
Aug 20, 2023 at 08:19 AM
Amontillado wrote:
Brandon Sanderson advocates outlining each plot thread separately, then
>moving the entries from each thread outline into a master outline.
I assumed every multi-thread writer who uses outlines did this. Easier to make it internally consistent. Includes the pre-story of characters, doesn’t include intermingled threads (which obviously exist as themselves).
I assume that some programs are more helpful than others.