Throw the Rules Out the Window and Write the Damn Book!

From Fact to Fiction

The title is misleading. It’s not really “the rules” I’m struggling with. It’s the process. Plotter vs. Pantser. These two fools are always at war inside my head. When I started writing fiction, Miss Pantser reigned. She was carefree—giddy even—and never second guessed the twists and turns she put on paper…that is until she received her first rejection and her second and her third. (You get the idea.) That’s when Ms. Plotter came to the “rescue” with encouragement like this: Buck up. Buckle down. Take a workshop on plotting. Take a workshop on characterization. Take another workshop. Take one more. You’ll be fine.

What Ms. Plotter was really saying—and Miss Pantser was too naïve to hear—was change the way you’ve been writing. Change is hard. Still, Miss Pantser agreed to be “coached” by Ms. Plotter until plotting was the name of the game.

Plotting sucks. I’ve never questioned myself…

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