plot points

[marycatelli]

Ah, getting somewhere in your story

'Cheshire Puss,' she began, rather timidly, as she did not at all know whether it would like the name: however, it only grinned a little wider. 'Come, it's pleased so far,' thought Alice, and she went on. 'Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?'

'That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,' said the Cat.

'I don't much care where--' said Alice.

'Then it doesn't matter which way you go,' said the Cat.

'--so long as I get somewhere,' Alice added as an explanation.

'Oh, you're sure to do that,' said the Cat, 'if you only walk long enough.'

Not good advice for (some) writers, because "somewhere" can be the middle of a trackless expanse of rock with no water. I took up outlining because petering out after a page of outline was less depressing.

But a string of incidents in an outline can also peter out. An end point helps, I find. But it has to be a complete end point. Currently poking at

• He gets exonerated. (how? Catch the bad guys in the act? very vague, that)
• she decides to change her job, her superpowers are more useful in a less glamorous job (what triggers it? What were the incidents that changed her mind?)
• she discovers the secret behind the fantasy world (kind of hard to plant clues without knowing the secret)
• she rescues the prince (is that even the ending?)

Ah, the adventures of outlining