how do recommend starting a longer fic/any sort of writing??? getting past the first sentences (and being happy with it…) is one of the hardest parts of writing to me💔
Hi Kayak!! Hope you're well, I'll try to make my thoughts make sense here for you. Honestly I should make a powerpoint about some of my personal writing processes to see if it helps any of yall as baby authors.
Reminder that I am not a professional! Some of this advice might not work for you, I'm just sharing what I do <3
okay! How do I start a long fic?
For me, I've found that long fics happen by accident mostly. Margin of Error was ball parked to be 25-30 chapters but only because I was aiming for shorter chapters. We've learned now that MoE ranchers like to YAP and that I can cover a lot more plot in less chapters, so now she's 20 chapters :) She's one of those fics where I know what I want to happen, but figuring out the inbetween is something I tackle by chapter.
Last night I was talking about how I want Despair to be about 10-11 chapters, limiting the story so I can stretch it into a possible trilogy. The thing with Despair though, is that I've had plans for that to be big from the start. I had a little idea and ran away with it with the hopes of being like, the best thing I've ever written...
compared to sticks, a story with a start and end point that doesn't require me to tell every aspect of it, because it's told in oneshots. I can skip over a ton of time to get to a plot point and if I want to add to it later, then I can go back and add another one shot. This is a perk of doing a series of works compared to one long term fic.
okay, so you have an idea! Here's what I do:
Rotate the idea. Gather ideas about people and places. WRITE THEM DOWN. make a silly outline (it's okay for this outline to change)
Figure out what you want to happen! this is the main conflict or even just scenes you think you might want.
A good example of this, for me, was Margin of Error. Before it had a name, the first 14K written in my doc under "rancher college au" , back when Tango was a biker and it was a totally different story--I wrote all the good scenes first. I bascially had a few ideas of scenes I liked, and then I wrote them. so this is like the chapter 4 porch scene, and a kiss scene in what was orginally chpater 3, and another kiss scene that's now (I think?) chapter 9. I started by throwing out ideas, writing what made me the most excited and then letting the scene die when I wasn't having fun anymore.
This is a thing I do A LOT with MoE. I write till it stops and I figure out the rest later. There's no pressure to know everything right at the start. In fact, figuring it out as you go will help you come up with ideas/transitions that fit the story better. Compared to forcing them into a box that hasnt been built yet.
Take your scenes and start to build a time line.
For MoE, I picked a difficult conflict--emotions. There is no physical villian in MoE that I can plan around. if I were writing a super hero au, lets say, I would have a bad guy that I could plan a weakness that my characters would use to take him down. With emotional conflicts everything is internal and relies on the charaters thoughts and actions to be overcome. With most emotional conflicts, there might not be a satisfying ending. For MoE it's going to finish with a very big "it's not over, but we're working through it" feeling. It won't be as resolute as a physical conflict that will have a total ending.
having said this! pick a general conflict and then pad your scenes around it. As you write all those disconnected scenes you'll find the world will start to build itself. you'll notice things carrying through them, you'll write three or four of them, then realize theres an order in your head. maybe scenes two comes after three, then four followed by one. Use that and tack them down.
I'll use sticks as a visual example here. I have a string of ideas about sticks, one of them was Unsportsmanlike Conduct. I knew Countercurrent would come immediately after it and that sticks 3 (I really gotta name that) would come about a week after. I know that I want Tango to come see Jimmy play a game, I also know that I want that to be before Tango gets a concussion and can't play for a bit. I don't know the time between them, but I know I want it at some point.
You now have a timeline! Start figuring out how to fluff up the bits around each event.
I want my ranchers to kiss! they are gonna kiss after their first coffee date (in this example), how do we get to the coffee date? what happens on the date? what happens after the kiss? the questions you ask to build a scene are a lot more simple than you think they'll be.
one of these charts is helpful! you can use a chart like this for EVERYTHING. The whole story, a chapter, a scene. Keep in mind that the falling action happens much quicker than the rising action. Prepare for the climax to hit, and then the resolution to come tumbling quickly after. (The climax for MoE is chapter 17 of 20, as an example)
you have all the bits for an outline! how do you write it now?
My biggest advice when writing a long form story is to write it out of order. I'm so serious, don't fall into the that BS of having to start at the begining and build it up. Write whatever makes you happy, jump around when you get stuck, if the flow stops take a break and do something else.
MoE chapters take me forever, yeah, but that's because I don't force a scene. I move on to a different one and keep thinking about what caused the other to stop. Taking over three months to write chapter five has given me a ton of time to think about transitions and to make sure the characters and their motivations feel right.
Follow your train of thought, write things down before you lose them, let inspiration guide you. I cannot tell you how many times I've been writing a scene and just gone,
Flowery sentence about how the character feels and lifting a hand to do-- insert action--. the character then says "line of dialog"
like guys, it doesn't have to be perfect on the first draft! Not everything will present itself right away. If you have the middle and end of a scene but now start, that's okay! write the middle and end, then come back to it.
I also recomend rubber ducking your friends. If you don't know what rubber ducking it, it's a thing computer coders do! When they have a problem they can't solve, they talk about it outloud to a rubber duck. Often, when you explain a problem and lay it out for someone else to understand, you'll solve it yourself. I've done this to stuffed animals, to pets, my dad (who had no clue what I was talking about). It's a lot better if you have friends who can toss some ideas at you, but physically talk it out. If you cant do that, type a string of thoughts. as if talking out loud, start to lay out the problem and talk yourself through it. I have the perfect example for this and its a massive spoiler so I cant share it >:( ug.
either way!!! That's like all the advice I can offer??? I hope this helps?
UH, when it comes to gathering inspiration I turn to music. I make playlists and spin the idea around and talk about it. then I just write what my fingers want to.
Just write it! write it bad, write it scared. Bad writing is still writing. Put it on paper and fix it later.
(If I am not happy with a scene. I will sit on it. I will wait until I can find what makes me upset about it, then find a way to fix it. It will not be perfect on the first try.)
