Mary Catelli's Erraticly Updated and Exceedingly Ill-Organized Journal

the muddle in the middle

Tue, 28 Oct 2025 04:43:15 GMT

Events are moving. Forward in the outline, backward in the outline, out of the outline entirely.

I think I didn't think this part through clearly enough.

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Knowing Thyself, and Outlining

Wed, 15 Oct 2025 22:42:29 GMT

I essayed

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Linking The Beginning To The Ending

Thu, 10 Jul 2025 22:48:10 GMT

I essayed

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twisting the tale

Fri, 04 Jul 2025 02:04:06 GMT

So I'm off and considering a story. A fairy tale world in which they know the tales, after the manner of The Princess Seeks Her Fortune.

So when the stepmother and stepdaughter end up running away to seek their fortunes, they know they have an odd tale.

Unfortunately, so do I.

I think I may have to poke about tales with twos to joggle something loose.

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My Writing Process

Fri, 02 May 2025 17:05:53 GMT

I essay'ed

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juggling death

Fri, 28 Mar 2025 04:05:50 GMT

Trying to wrassle two stories in outline form at once. At least as much as the plot bunnies will allow

One has revealed that the heroine's heroic efforts to save lives will produce a backlash. People will have to die. Fortunately, it will be logical that these are people who cause trouble in another plotline.

The other one has revealed that the heroine will have to hear some backstory from the not-quite-love-interest-yet about how the number of wizards is so few, and he's the only adult in their number.

Sometimes plot bunnies multiply in odd ways.

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juggling two stories

Sat, 08 Mar 2025 04:59:49 GMT

Oh you plot bunnies!

Two very different stories about a character who finds herself in another world. The means by which they are moved differ, the situations they find themselves in differ, their powersets differ, and the reasons they have powers differ. Their enemies differ, and so does the conflict.

This probably means they should have different reactions to arrival, perhaps all the more in that they do not glide over it as a machine that the readers will simply accept as not relevant to the plot. (It is relevant in both cases, though -- the reasons differ.)

Both are going to have metaphysical questions, though. No matter how different I make them.

(And I don't even know if either one is a full story yet.)

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ah, the scene

Mon, 07 Oct 2024 03:46:50 GMT

I write in the outline that the hero fights an evil knight here, rescuing a prisoner.

I note that ravens are involved.

But I need to elaborate it into an actual scene.

Ah, the discovery you make about the adequacy of outlines.

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the plot clumpens

Tue, 12 Mar 2024 04:17:47 GMT

As the meme goes:

Well, this story is clumpening. The outline hit the high points, which is good to ensure that it doesn't die on me half way -- BUT --

It's moving very sluggishly between the high points. At least the stuff is moving. Even if I do have to go back and put in things. Lots of things.

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ah notes

Sat, 13 Jan 2024 04:53:16 GMT

Was returning to an outline.

I remember that I decided two characters meeting had to happen later. Now I am wrestling with how she was important in how he managed to persuade two others of his harmlessness.

I think they may have to have met earlier.

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who was that?

Wed, 27 Sep 2023 03:07:50 GMT

A character is about to learn something.

( Read more... )

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ham-handed orchestration

Fri, 21 Jul 2023 03:15:01 GMT

There's a group of people. They have to go do something.

( Read more... )

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does he belong?

Sat, 17 Jun 2023 03:43:53 GMT

There's a thread in this story, that might not belong. A mercenary man, who's a magical knight, and a little girl he rescued.

( Read more... )

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outlining out of order

Tue, 02 May 2023 03:54:23 GMT

One advantage of a plot structure -- Save the Cat, Hero's Journey, Lester Dent's, what have you -- is that it gives you a place to put story ideas in order when the story is incomplete.

( Read more... )

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bright ideas

Tue, 25 Apr 2023 03:57:01 GMT

So there are two scenes.

( Read more... )

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checking off the outline

Wed, 15 Mar 2023 02:48:08 GMT

So the big dramatic battle's coming up and about to spin off our hero into a setting where he can do things and expect consequences more than "perhaps survive."

( Read more... )

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back and forth

Thu, 17 Nov 2022 03:50:55 GMT

Was coming up to the climax in the outline.

( Read more... )

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out of order

Fri, 04 Nov 2022 03:02:23 GMT

Some people can write scenes out of order.

I do that, and I generally manage to miss the scene when plodding on toward the ending. So I write in order.

( Read more... )

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notes, notes everywhere, and not a plot to work

Thu, 27 Oct 2022 03:28:10 GMT

Keeping a collection of random notes on a story is wise. Something that may work out brilliantly may yet have no place in an outline because it's not situated in time, and you don't want to lose it.

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something happens here

Sun, 25 Sep 2022 03:59:24 GMT

When working on an outline, I need it to be detailed enough.

( Read more... )

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for once, fighting

Tue, 13 Sep 2022 03:56:19 GMT

Outlining along, told myself that it was a big fight this time and it's not enough to leave the hero and the villainess's powers vague. I have to establish them.

Turns out I have to do the moves in the fight, too. Partly because there are other characters that he has to maneuver about; if he didn't care about them, he could just turn tail and run, or else blast everything sight to try to kill her, except in their absence I don't think he would want to kill.

Good thing for him that she wants him prisoner, not dead.

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what about the children

Fri, 15 Jul 2022 04:20:54 GMT

There's a point in the plot in which the character has charge of some children. For a long time, and sole charge.

( Read more... )

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plot points

Tue, 30 Nov 2021 04:19:40 GMT

Ah, getting somewhere in your story
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the sequel

Fri, 17 Sep 2021 03:35:14 GMT

Finished outlining my sequel to my Sleeping Beauty story -- set the century later, when she wakes up.

It's about the prince who is her cousin's great-grandson, not the one who wakes her up. Though it does affect him.

( Read more... )

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a bee, a wolf, a duck. . . .

Wed, 15 Sep 2021 03:11:32 GMT

Once yesterday's love interest introduced herself, her part of the story fell together. So I could consider the important part of the story, where the hero has to carry out the impossible tasks.

( Read more... )

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