Planning and Organizing a Story

There are various ways you can plan out and organize your ideas before and as you write your fic.

The first step is brainstorming. Usually there isn't much order to this, you just jot down whatever ideas come to mind. Once you have those ideas, you can start organizing.

Character profiles: You can create separate pages/charts for each of your characters and write out their background information and character traits for your own reference only. In this case, listing adjectives is okay. However, once you actually begin to write the characters into the story, you need to take those characteristics and adjectives and express them using indirect characterization. You will probably find that some of these facts and details don't really matter to the story at all. In that case, there's no need to spent too much time on them. You might mention them in passing, but that's it. See the Getting to Know Your Characters section in Chapter 8 for more details.

Family trees and relationship diagrams: When you have a large cast of characters, these can help you keep tabs on the connections between your characters--who is related to whom, who is friends with whom, who is in love with whom, and even who dislikes whom.

Timelines: As I have mentioned before, it can be very helpful to note down the chronological order of events and when exactly they occur.

Maps: You don't have to be a wonderful artist, but if you're creating a new world, try making a simple map for it to show distance, area, and physical (mountains, rivers, forests) and political (cities, kingdoms, provinces) features.

Chapter-by-chapter mini-summaries: This gives you a broader view of what you're writing. Do you have too many chapters that focus on dialogue and not enough on action? Is the pacing just right for your story, or are there giant stretches where you have very little developments? Are you making good progress toward your goal?

Outlines: The most basic sort of outline would most likely have the exposition (beginning), (high point) or turning point, and denouement (ending/resolution) noted. After that, it's a matter of filling in the blanks in between. You can outline on a broad scale, dividing your story into major parts and sorting them that way, or you can go by chapter, within a chapter, or even within a scene. You can also organize subplots and work them into their proper places. You can combine all of these things into a single outline.

Here are some examples of the structures of outlines. These are extremely basic, so feel free to be much more detailed (not to mention creative) with your outline. Note that a scene may or may not contain action, and the order of things doesn't have to follow what I outlined.

Exposition

• The girl finds out she's going to an awesome school with gorgeous hot guys.

Major Event 1

• She meets the boy that she will fall in love with.

Major Event 2

• He asks her out on a date.

Major Event 3

• She begins to realize he's not what she thought he was.

/Turning Point

• They have a huge fight.

Major Event 4

• They stop arguing and spend some time away from each other.

Denouement

• She decides to break up with him and move on.

Chapter 1 (Exposition)

• Background information on orphan girl.

Chapter 2

• Revelation that the girl's life is about to change for the better.

Chapter 3

• Girl meets her oppas.

Chapter 4

• Oppas save the girl.

Chapter 5

• Oppas confess.

Chapter 6 ()

• Girl is forced to choose one of the boys.

Chapter 7 (Denouement)

• She marries all of them and lives happily ever after.

Chapter XX

Scene 1

• The girl is walking to school thinking about her lack of a love life.

Scene 2

• The main boy gets stalked by a bunch of crazy fangirls and is spotted by the girl.

Scene 3

• Girl sees boy again in her class.

Scene XX

Description of surroundings, people, time frame, etc.

Initial dialogue.

Explanation.

Action.

More dialogue.

More action.

Dialogue again.

Closing paragraph/transition to next scene.

Exposition

• Girl starts a new year of school.

Main Plot Event 1

• Girl accidentally bumps into hot stranger.

Subplot Event 1

• Girl is told by mother to improve grades.

Main Plot Event 2

• Girl finds out she is in the same class as the hot guy.

Main Plot Event 3

• The hot guy walks her home because she has to stay after class late.

Subplot Event 2

• Girl gets a tutor who is also attractive.

Main Plot Event 4

• The girl is the hot guy's lab partner. They work on a lab report together in the library.

Subplot Event 3

• Girl's grades begin to improve, and the tutor starts flirting with her.

Main Plot and Subplot converge

• Hot guy finds out that girl has a tutor.

• Hot guy and tutor have an epic badass fight.

Denouement

• Tutor wins and girl starts dating him because he's smart and helpful. Her mother approves.

Chapter 1 (Exposition)

Background info on girl

Scene 1

Dialogue between girl and boy.

Scene 2

Girls goes to cram school.

Finds out boy go the same cram school.

Dialogue.

Study buddy arrangement created. (Major Event 1)

Whether or not you want to use an outline is up to you, but again, it's definitely a good idea to at least know where you're going with a story.