It’s been three weeks since my first novel, The Senator: A Blake Jordan Thriller was released. I’ve had a blast reading the reviews from fans who loved the story and can’t wait for the next book.
So I spent all week working on the outline for book two, which I plan to finish next week so I can start writing in the next few days with the goal of finishing the followup thriller before summer.
As I worked on plotting the outline and working on developing the characters and their story arcs, I thought I’d share with you the reason why once I start writing, I don’t do any rewrites when I find my characters painted into a corner that I don’t know how to get them out of at first.
When it comes to writers, we usually fall into one of two categories: plotters or pantsers.
Pantsers write by the seat of their pants. They crack open their laptop and just start writing, hoping a story somehow evolves and they make changes to fix their story down the road if they need to. That’s how Stephen King writes, so it should be a good enough strategy, many writers reason.
I fall into the plotter category.
Before I sit down and start writing, I outline the entire novel, chapter-by-chapter, with a detailed plot showing well-motivated characters overcoming obstacles in pursuit of a goal at all times.
Plotting a novel with a thorough outline before you ever write a single word is one of the most important things you can do to make sure you don’t waste time later when you’re actually writing the novel. But outlining doesn’t guarantee you won’t write your characters into a corner.
Although I had plotted The Senator, I still wound up with characters in situations where it seemed like there was no way out and all hope was lost. That’s because outlines are high-level. They don’t take into account subplots and actions that other characters take that reverberate throughout the story and how those decisions impact future events.
And here’s where I think I handle things a bit differently from other writers: I don’t rewrite scenes or make changes earlier in the story to get my characters out of bad situations.
That’s not typical.
Many writers waste a lot of time going back and trying to change prior events in their story in hopes to get their characters to end up with a different outcome than the one they’re currently stuck in, kind of like a choose-your-own-adventure book. Then they wonder why it takes years to finish their first novel. What they don’t realize I think is that by fixing one story problem, it can cause a new problem to show up. The whole story gets so complicated that they give up or start over.
That’s one reason why I don’t change my story once I start writing. But the main reason why I don’t rewrite is because I believe that fiction should be reflective of real life, wherever possible.
It’s called playing the hand you’re dealt.
We can’t change the bad things that happen to us. We can’t change history or turn back time.
But what we can do is think up a creative way to get ourselves out of the corners of life that we paint ourselves into.
One thing to note for writing thrillers is that in order to write a good story, your main characters have to find themselves in terrible trouble, up against the wall, with seemingly no way out. It’s called “the dark moment” and it happens in every novel around the halfway mark of the book. It also happens before the hero gets a surprise break, a new lead, or makes a realization that completely turns their situation around. These things have to happen for the story to be “good.”
So the next time you find yourself in terrible trouble, painted into a corner of life with what seems like no way out, don’t try to rewrite history. Don’t waste your time worrying about what could have been. And don’t give up hope or believe that things will never get better for you.
Instead, think of a creative way to get out of the situation that you’ve found yourself in.
Because you’re really at the halfway mark in your adventure and without the struggle you’re facing, you wouldn’t have a good story to tell down the road when all of the dust settles.