We've talked a great deal on this blog about plotting. Who is pantsing it and who is plotting along. We've discussed storyboarding, outlining and even collaging. A couple of crew members balk at all this plotting talk saying it constricts them or freaks them out to see plot points or even scene ideas written down somewhere. They act as if it's carved in stone because they commit it to paper in any way and that crimps their style. My reaction has always been this is silly. Nothing says it's written in stone. It's all changeable, flexible, disposable. You're the writer and you are in charge.

And these words have back around to bite me on the ass.

I've been trying to move forward in the old WIP. Months ago I wrote a sequence of scenes down in a notebook including what would generally happen in each scene, what I wanted to accomplish with it, and maybe a line or two of dialogue. I grew dependent on the notebook as if I couldn't go forward without referring back to it. But when I came to the next scene in the notebook, it wasn't working. I just sat and stared at the screen. Words didn't come.

Then I realized that wasn't the right scene for this spot in the story. And what I wanted to accomplish with the scene needs to happen later anyway. So a new scene appeared and with it, a new character. For some reason, I had been reluctant to go against those words I had written months ago. As if I couldn't change it. I was restricted, restrained, my style was officially crimped.

So, I am a big enough pirate to say, I was wrong. I still think jotting down scenes can help at some point and there are people who can plot the entire book ahead of time and it writes itself. But I now understand the resistance to plotting on paper. The need to just let it come. The freak out shivers that afflicted Sin when the Captain made her plot.

I'm not sure if this makes me a total pantser, but I am glad this revelation came before I was ready to throw the damn computer out the window. I have a new character to develop, a new conflict and motivation for my heroine (YEEHAW!), and a new occupation for my heroine. This will be her third sort of. But this one will fit much better.

So, have you had to break any chains lately? Had any new crafting revelations? Have a large quantity of alcohol I can consume to get me through the "I told you so" dances that will be taking place all day?

I subscribe to Urban Word of the Day, which if you don't subscribe, you should. It's damned hysterical. I subscribed upon learning the word: "mantastic", which is basically like the word "fantastic" with some testosterone to Bruce Willis it up a few notches. They always use the UWOTD in a sentence, so you're not looking stupid when you show off your new knowledge. "Following his fifth keg of beer, Kevin ripped the horn off of his pet narwhal, and then nailed his porn-star girlfriend for hours. Subsequently, he felt mantastic." I mean, it really makes you want to run out and use that word, doesn't it?

Last week's UWOTD Keeper-of-the-Week was: WSD.

I hadn't heard of this acronymic little gem yet, and was amused to learn it means: Write Shit Down.

Clearly genius.

Saturday, Sin and I held our RWR face-to-face critique meeting. Sin is, what you might call, a commitmentphobe. Or maybe she's is too committed. After all, if you put something in writing, she thinks it can't be changed again. (Therefore if she doesn't so much as revise as scraps the whole thing and starts again from scratch.)

Being I'm content to fix Sin's phobias rather than mine, I whipped out my newest writing obsession, my storyboard that I drew my precious straight lines all over, and forced her to give me plot points to the book she's supposedly going to submit to the Golden Heart. (I say supposedly because she mentions this one as her GH submission and writes on her paranormal instead.)

We filled in the blank storyboard, despite Sin's screaming refusal to do anything so tedious as put a story plot in storyboard/synopsis form. It was a success! It worked, much to Sin's chagrin. It's worked twice for me so far--though I'm going to have to recreate one and replot it some to make it better.

Why did it work? Because we WSD.

Now, the storyboard isn't really anything. It's twenty blocks (a 5x4 grid), assuming you're writing a 400 page book. 1st block: Hook; 2nd block: Inciting Incident; 4th block: Point of No Return; 5th block: Turning Point 1. (At least that's how I've set up my blocks at any rate; I'm combining this storyboarding with the 10 Essential Scenes from The Writer's Little Helper.) In the 4th row, I have a blank block, the CRISIS block, two CLIMAX blocks, and The End block.

5th block as we said is Turning Point 1; 10th block is Turning Point 2, which is a BIG EVENT block--the halfway point of your book and a big reveal of something; 15th block is Turning Point 3; and 20th block is The End.

Marnee is fond of the four-act structure--so basically everything that happens in row two is COMPLICATIONS and everything that happens in row three is CONSEQUENCES.

Then it gets more complicated with color-coding your post-its and such, but it's like a game! I never knew plotting could be a game! And you can glance at all you have and go: "Well, this is revealed here, so we probably need a hint somewhere around...here." And you scribble a note and plop it in a square where you think it will go. If you're not happy with it, you can move it around. It's more fun than a regular synopsis.

Even Sin could do it. Even though she didn't want to.

And yes, this is the same storyboarding that Manda at RV was talking about. It works. It really works! It's mantastic. So go get yourself some posterboard and post-its--and WSD.

So what is your favorite Urban Word of the Day? (Mine used to be "Sweet.") How do you feel about committing your plots to paper? Storyboarding or synopsises? Which is better?