Aw. She's Growing Up...

Important stuff first. My first 750 words are up on Fiction Groupie for Beta Club if you want to check it out. Any feedback would be awesome and appreciated. :)

Now for the real post.

I have always been and probably always will be a pantser—for the first draft anyway. I love not knowing exactly where things are headed in my story. It keeps me motivated and moving forward. But this rewrite has been much more challenging. Even though I've added/removed a few characters, changed a lot of the plot and rearranged the scenes a bit, overall, I know what needs to happen. For some reason though, I haven't been able to keep it straight in my head, and I find myself wanting to jump forward so I don't forget something important.

So I finally broke down and did it. I made an outline. My very first one. I know. I'm so proud of myself. :D I don't remember where I first saw this method, but it worked very well for me. I just made a list of everything I knew needed to happen, wrote each event on a Post-it and then arranged them like a puzzle on my shiny new whiteboard. (Did I mention I LOVE whiteboards?) It was actually kind of fun.

Doesn't it look pretty? I still have four key scenes that I'm not sure about where they will fit best, but the beauty of this method is I can rearrange things whenever I want. Feels much less restricting than how I've thought of outlining in the past.

So what about you? Do you outline, or are you a devoted pantser?

The Beta Club

Similar to MSFV's Secret Agent contest, Roni at Fiction Groupie is hosting a crit session every Tuesday and Thursday. Brave souls have offered up the openings of their precious manuscripts for some serious shredding. All with the hope of making their writing as shiny as possible. It can be brutal to be on the receiving end, but ultimately (when you can finally see through your tears ;)), it's so worth it.

Everyone is welcome to participate. Feel free to offer up any advice you think might be helpful. And if you're new to critiquing, this is a great way to get an idea of what goes into a critique and what to expect when you eventually get one. Because every good writer knows, you just can't be your best without those awesome critters.

Up today, is the very awesome Tere Kirkland. Good luck, Tere!

And I want to apologize for being a little absent lately around the blogosphere. I haven't been commenting as much as I would like, but that's because I've been COOKIN' on my manuscript. I wrote over 3000 words yesterday! Insane, I know. I hope I'm not jinxing myself by posting about it. ;) So, I'm not completely absent, just lurking a little more while the words are flowing so freely.

Happy Thursday, everyone! :)