Відео

I can easily give you a reason why. Everyone stops on a chapter. Much like tv episodes, small chapters make people feel as though they’re not too far away from the next checkpoint if they wish to read more. And stopping on a chapter allows them to know where they last left off. On top of all of this, if they wish to go back in the book to reread part of it, chapters allow for easy access.

Love that kitty!

i kind of wanted the title to be 'should you plot or pant' and see where it goes

Great advice as ever but I seriously feared for your shelving at one point in the video !

One too common cliffhanger or foreshadowing pattern that breaks the last version is the, "At the time I didn't know that..." type of phrase. It also feels very lazy, like a cheap way to generate suspense when the writing lacks it.

“Retroactively predictable” Excellent term. I have always said that my favorite reads told me what was going to happen, but I didn’t believe them.

Wait, the mid-credits scene revealed the secrets to the cat appearances: Carl bribes the beast with treats! As for chapters: I just write in scenes, and present them generally one scene = one chapter. Sometimes a few scenes in a row are shorter or smaller moments -- they go together into one chapter. Sometimes a scene is such a Big Moment that it works to break it into two chapters, and, rarely, even three.

"Why do we jeed pants?" 😅 Great advice to consider how the chapter stands alone. I had kind of forgotten you can end a chapter with a resolution. My draft is being handwritten so I can't just check easily what I did, and don't want to look back analytically until I'm done, but I'm going to keep this in mind from now on. I think I did in the first third actually, then in middle third spanners kept being thrown into the works. I definately need some more resolution endings now though, but like you said, progress the emotional beats.

Chapters prove to the reader that you know how to structure a story so they have faith that you can fulfill them in the end and continue to read. No...That's too serious and thoughful. I mean...Cat Butt!!

@30 seconds Kitty: "HI YOU TUBE FANS! " 😂😂😂

When I was younger, I used to write very short chapters. Like a chapter a scene like you said. But really, I feel like good paced variety is generally a good rule for most stories. Like most mid length, some short, only a handful long. Otherwise, I definitely thin there's an art to chapter breaks, and it helps you and the readers keep track and remember where things are. It's a win win for both parties.

Hilary Mantels Wolf Hall doesn’t seem to have any chapters, just scene after scene for a hundred pages. It’s wearisome

In most of my novels the stories span a week or two, so it's very convenient to start every new day at the beginning of a chapter. The only backside to this that I can think of is that the chapters seldom end with a cliffhanger, but instead with the resolution of a mystery, so the reader may not be strongly motivated to continue reading.

I opened youtube to search your channel to sign up for your writing program and this video was at the top just uploaded. 👍

More curl and Carl.

I feel, very strongly, that this is an assault on Pantsers.

The video was good. But did I miss the cat? Where's the cat? That's where you lost me.

Regarding your first test - what if a specific character is a total bully? True - a bully will have members of his posse who like them - but the protagonists won’t like the members of that posse either. (Though don’t worry - I have reasons why he thinks he’s the good guy.)

I've written the prologue to a novel I think will take four years to finish a first draft of. I knew the beginning and the end of the prologue, and was very surprised with the course it took to get there. There's a pretty pivotal section that I came up with as I wrote it, but made a lot of sense in the progress of the prologue. I imagine that's how I'll write the whole book. It feels natural and right to me. But I'm fairly certain that an editor will tell me the prologue as a whole meanders too much as a result, and will want me to delete it. I suppose I just have to write the novel as I want to, and cross that bridge when I get there. Much to think about.

Agree with all of that. I'd add two points: 1. Regarding your last element, it's important to think in scenes and organise your story accordingly. A scene should have people in it and preferably have some element of conflict. This is why so many beginners' books start with scene-setting - descriptions of weather, places or people: the ultimate in Telling, but it's actually the writer trying to get the environment 'right' in their head before starting the real work. Instead, place one or more of your characters in the middle of doing something, hopefully in conflict. Show the character in action, don't just tell us about him or her. 2. In relation to your first point, a good way to get readers to infer is by the use of metaphor or simile - analogies in general. For example: "He had the nervous air of someone afraid his cat would suddenly bite him." Or, "He moved with the authority of a cat untroubled by lesser beings." Or, "He sat glumly behind his desk like a professor who had seen too many failing students and had given up hope." Not great examples, I know, but they make the reader do a bit of work rather than just saying "He was nervous," etc.

The first novel I wrote, I pantsed and it was a disaster - it took two years to write and was utterly terrible. Since then I've always had at least a basic outline and as a result it usually takes me no more than three months to do a first draft.

My first draft of my first novel was about halved pants and as I got towards the end I realized I needed a better idea of where it was going. So i plotted a very rough outline and then pants in between. Was a ton of fun. Ended up doing that for my second novel and it went really well.

I love how you spoke slower in this one. Sometimes the info goes a little too fast for my brain but ut was easier to keep up this time. Your kitty: 🤣

a showy way versus a telly way...why did that hit me right between the eyes???

Before I plot I already have a story that I want to tell in my head. It's like an engineering project. I need to know what I'm trying to do. The actual writing is just laying down the steel and concrete. That doesn't mean there can't be design and flair. A bridge can use all kinds of designs, but the objective of getting from one side of the river to the other never changes.

I enjoy pantzing most of my story but I also really enjoy planning my characters and key events very throughly

I've been a pantser for years at this point. I found that because of this i never reached a proper end to my books. This time around I decided to do my own version of plotting/outlining, where I wrote down plot points to specific scenes i wanted my characters to deal with. Thanks to it, I not only found that I needed to break up what I was writing into a sequel and eventually multiple books, but I was able to write my first draft and finish it in a faster timeframe than I ever did before. Now while I'm editing, I've realized that my book needs to be split up again so I'm back to my plot points, and I'm struggling with it currently because my brain is telling me "you've already finished it, you dunce!" But it's a necessary step for me to find where I'm lacking in character development and the like.

I am really curious…how often do people who pants only, finish a novel? It seems like such chaos…

I never really liked plotting especially as a kid. I was frustrated with the four square, bubble chart, and Vin Diagram. I even didn’t like the tree branch method or the seven steps method that we did all the time in school. I prefer free flowing, creative writing with no restrictions, which only usually happens in AP honor roll classes.

Great explanation! Love your realistic presentation of these typical writing problems. Most writing helpers are more like: "Write an outline and you will finish your novel in 1 month." - No you won't and I appreciate you talking openly about this! I wrote my first draft on the basis of three scenes I randomly developed in my head and an idea for a world. My five POV characters were all audience stand ins from a different point of society. They had no arks, just did what the plot dictated and in the end I ended up with a mediocre piece of fiction that felt like a lot of hollywood movies today. So for the second draft I tried to outline everything. My characters journeys, their ways of thinking, their history, chapter 1 - 20 etc. That failed horribly since I could not feel what they were going through. End result: I outlined my big setpieces, the starting points of my characters and roughly the first ~ five chapters. Pantsing it from here and it is going great. Only two polished chapters deep but it feels right and the feedback I have gotten so far from friends and writing partners has been awesome. I incorporated a lot I learned from your videos. They helped me greatly! This video was different though. It was the first one that I could relate to and not just learn from. Thank you for the work you do!

My motto, plot in your head, pantser on the page.

I just found your channel and subscribed last night. Thanks for the preview. But I have to say that I’m confused by the lack of 🐱 in the preview. Most content creators only hint at the 🐱 in their free content and then put the 🐱 in your face behind the paywall. You seem to have taken the opposite approach. 😊

The process I've developed is making a LOT of notes and then just writing the first draft. I keep notes in cheap spiral notebooks I buy at Walmart for a dollar a piece to record Ideas I have. I figure I'll know what I want by the end of the first draft, and then fix it as I write the second and third.

And what about backpantsing?

What about Plantsing?

Hi, I've watching your videos for a while now and I have to say I love your straight forward style of presenting information. As a new writer your videos make it seem very possible to finish a story. And do so well. I'm going to sign up for your course in the new year. Thank you.

While I agree that the protagonists should be larger than life, don't hammer their every urge down into the last numbskull. There are always people who don't get it and you end up spoiling the dish for all the others by adding too much salt.

By the way, buying fried chicken for someone is the purest form of love.

The donkeys who like to write in the passive voice are angry with you.

Charles Dickens "Great Expectations" - title. 🤣

Great message as usual! I have a question. Would you consider having a character describe another character's traits behind their back as showing or telling?