this frog is emerging from its slumber

Two days ago I finished the zero draft of a novel. It's about 53K and I wrote it in about six months by sticking to the 300 words a day thing. It's a trash heap of word chaos, and "finishing" it was akin to crashing a plane into the ground, but I'm still kind of floored that stringing small amounts of words on a page and forcing myself to write through a void of a middle actually gets things done. (Not a clean method mind you, I wrote 4 versions of chapter 11 until one stuck, but it still worked, albeit kind of arduously.)

After I finished the draft I panicked a bit, cause like, I didn't want to break the streak (289 days and counting) but I don't have another thing ready enough I can dive right into. So I've decided to draft a rough story outline for what I want to do next. It's a standalone fantasy/romance type thing, but there's a huge hole in the middle of it and I'm afraid to start it without knowing what needs to be there (I so suck at middles) so now my 300 a day is just writing what happens in the story. Kind of like a very robust outline. Lore, backstory, lead up, whatever informs the story and where it needs to go is going on the page. It's even looser writing than before which makes getting the words down much easier. But I feel like this will really give me a fighting chance to get through the next book.

Yr "robust outline" sounds a lot like a film treatment. Have you ever read one? It's basically like the prose translation of what we see/hear onscreen. Minimal stage or camera direction, more just "Jesse is a 31 year old guy who overcame a rough background and now owns a plant store in a neighborhood that is becoming gentrified. After establishing shots of the block and building exterior on a grey morning with torrential rain, we see Jesse tending plants in the dimly-lit shop. Over his shoulder, we see vague motion through the plate glass front window, focus shifts, and outside the shop is a very rain-bedraggled man (Santos, 28, project manager at MegaGardenCo). Jesse watches him struggle with a broken umbrella he throws away in disgust, but quickly jogs over to pick out of the gutter. As Santos looks around for a more suitable place to ditch the umbrella skeleton, Jesse takes pity, unlocks the front door and invites Santos to come inside the shop and take shelter from the rain."

Well that got away from me. No, I'm not writing that "You've Got Mail" plant boutique/Home Depot gay romance unless whoever was the lit agent for that hockey thing agrees to represent the book and shop film rights.

ANYWAY.

I love any kind of non-traditional "outline." The story of the story, the notes, the scraps of dialog, the scene-saving phrase that came to you in a dream and you scribbled it in sharpie on yr forearm first thing upon waking so it didn't get lost. I find it helpful for planning and energising for writing; I hope you find yr mysterious middle!

BE A STUDENT OF WHAT YOU ADMIRE

DO IT BADLY RATHER THAN NOT AT ALL

TO DESPAIR IS TO CEDE VICTORY TO THOSE WHO DO NOT DESERVE IT

BROADEN YOUR CULTURAL HORIZONS

REVEL IN THE ANALOG

ACTION ABSORBS ANXIETY