Can't Get Off My Duff

Cooking up a storm, even cleaning the house. Garden chores done, Christmas shopping underway, all that good stuff, but the chapter by chapter outline remains, well, unfinished, nay unstarted.

I went through the book again, cutting 1500 words and adding a couple hundred new words. Just trying to get a handle on how this thing will work. Obviously not a I II III abc outline. That would take hundreds of pages. I started off with a scenes within a chapter outline and that promised to get out of hand as well. Now I'm back to a summary of each chapter with major plot points, along with who and where the scene takes place. Any big conflicts noted. Have to get going on this. Even "googled" the topic without useful results. So what the hell is a chapter by chapter outline?

This ain't fun. I like dusting better. Making pie crust a lot better. Cutting a few more words here and there is still better. Chris Roerden's Don't Murder Your Mystery is really teaching me stuff. Everytime I read a new chapter I cut more words. However, that isn't getting the outline done, although undoubtedly the book gets better with each deletion.

I do believe the answer is place butt on chair and get going. So many writing dilemnas are solved by placing butt on chair. Of course that means don't send email, don't blog, just do the outline. The agent just wants to see the arc of the plot. The plot has one. Doesn't it? Ye gods. It really does.

Plant butt on chair.

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