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RE: School Yard Stories #002 - The Wheelie Bin Mafia - Chapter 3
Thanks for sharing this chapter of your story! Do you write in a linear way (from the beginning until the end) or do you first do some research, plotting, drafting etc.?
Hi @organduo - thanks so much for reading and commenting. I tend to plot my ideas out on post-it notes (or some sort of sticky paper) and then place these on a large wall, or whiteboard. I keep adding and adding until there is enough to move around and play with. I will stew on themes and concepts for a while, slowly manipulating the post-its from place to place.
Slowly, I try and form some sort of narrative and determine a timeline of sorts. I decide on a writing technique and try and fit my story to that technique. Sometimes, it crashes, and I need to start again, but, sometimes it works and I commence putting pen to paper (or finger to keyboard).
This particular piece, I wrote a couple of decades ago as a 1300(ish) word short story, and wanted to try and breathe life into it again. However, it has sort of evolved to a point where it is nothing like the story I imagined all those years ago. It didn't't even really begin the same, so I'm not surprised it is taking on a completely different form.
I think it would be fair to say that the process differs from story to story. But usually, I'll use a fairly similar approach to flesh out aspects of the original idea.
I'd like to add that your story captured my attention from the very first sentence. I don't know if it's because you were talking about death or because of your great suspense writing skills... But I enjoyed it a lot and looking forward for more... Sounds like policeman diary regular people don't know anything about.
You’re too kind @organduo. I think I enjoy writing the first sentence just as much as the rest of the story. I hope to get the next, which will probably be the final, chapter for this series up by the end of next week.
Really interesting techniques you are using with post-it notes and a whiteboard, because... you can touch it.
Many writers today use story building software but your tried-and-true physical approach works even better, I think. And similar to what I would imagine police investigators would use.:)
By the way, your comment with some illustrations could become a separate post to enlighten your fans who might be wondering the same thing...
I still prefer using some manual techniques, It helps me to be able to really visualise the story, and often times, a screen just doesn't do that well enough. I get really creative standing and pacing in front of a board or wall!
Thanks for the vote of confidence, but I'm not too sure how many of those upvotes are actually 'fans'! I had about 97% of them come through within 15 minutes (it's about a 17 minute read) after @curie upvoted this post, so I need to be real and understand than most of these are probably from a curation trail, and therefore, the bulk of the voters probably didn't even read it.
But, one such as yourself, who obviously did read it, is enough to make it worthwhile.
Interesting. Yes, most of the upvotes obviously are automatic. Did you do something in particular special for Curie to find your exceptional post as opposed to the others you wrote that were not picked up by the curators?
No, I just posted it as usual. Shared it on the #steemitbloggers Discord channel and I guess one of the Curie moderators found it. I don’t really know how they find what they upvote, but I’m always grateful when they stumble across one of my posts.