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My love-hate relationship with Scrivener is long and ridiculous. When I started this current ms (well, technically this one), I started it in Scrivener. Single POV, straightforward YA fantasy, I thought. I entered it in the Hodderscape thing and barreled onward, mostly writing it by hand then typing it up into Scrivener.
Then I got annoyed that I could only use Scrivener at home - so I took it out, put it in Word, and used the Outline feature to create a Scrivener-like outline on the side. We were happy.
Got a wild hair and decided you know what, why not just keep it in Scrivener - and change the POV! From first person to third! BACK TO SCRIVENER. Wait, I realized dammit, it is MUCH easier to change things overall in Word. Back to word.
In Word it stayed, and grew, for a long time. But as I got closer to the end of Aneli's story, I realized just how incomplete it was. I love the story, the world, and realized her POV was not enough to tell the story I wanted to tell. Since it just so happened I had another fantasy sitting around 15 years or more that was in this world, I considered - could the two be combined into a whole? Turns out they absolutely could. So I combined them, kinda willy-nilly - Aneli, the YA story, was set apart from the original fantasy - she is of the people who are my other peoples' enemy, though she grew up a refugee far away from the rest of her real people. So that was pretty easy, honestly.
After that, I printed the whole dang 220,000 thing out and went through it, part by part, and took a full Moleskin notebook to outline all the various characters and their threads. And that is when I realized I needed to see the overall picture at a glance because I knew I needed to shift things around. But how to do that? Notecards? Spreadsheet?
Scrivener.
SO BACK IT GOES INTO SCRIVENER...
And I am glad of it. I LOVE the notecard feature! The Outliner, which takes from the notecards, is fabulous too. I'm now working my way through each chapter, moving parts around easily in the notecard section and adding blank ones for a few characters who need more. It seems like an awful lot of work for a book not finished, but being able to tell at a quick glance what is going on. I make the notecards different colors for the different characters, and use the status feature to point out which ones still need drafting. I added Scrivener for Ipad so I can haul it around with me and leave the computer behind.
I keep setting goals for this story, finished by X date, but I think now that I can say another five months and I will have the draft done. Finally. For real.
This story is consuming my life, and I love that, though I know I am starting to hermit a bit over it. But that is what I have missed so much--wanting to be totally immersed in a world. My last 2 books didn't really do that for me. They were a chore to write. Not this, not now. Getting ready to go to Seattle for a week too (Tuesday through the next Tuesday) and I'll have lots of time to work on it then.
And that is it for today's ramblings.
Then I got annoyed that I could only use Scrivener at home - so I took it out, put it in Word, and used the Outline feature to create a Scrivener-like outline on the side. We were happy.
Got a wild hair and decided you know what, why not just keep it in Scrivener - and change the POV! From first person to third! BACK TO SCRIVENER. Wait, I realized dammit, it is MUCH easier to change things overall in Word. Back to word.
In Word it stayed, and grew, for a long time. But as I got closer to the end of Aneli's story, I realized just how incomplete it was. I love the story, the world, and realized her POV was not enough to tell the story I wanted to tell. Since it just so happened I had another fantasy sitting around 15 years or more that was in this world, I considered - could the two be combined into a whole? Turns out they absolutely could. So I combined them, kinda willy-nilly - Aneli, the YA story, was set apart from the original fantasy - she is of the people who are my other peoples' enemy, though she grew up a refugee far away from the rest of her real people. So that was pretty easy, honestly.
After that, I printed the whole dang 220,000 thing out and went through it, part by part, and took a full Moleskin notebook to outline all the various characters and their threads. And that is when I realized I needed to see the overall picture at a glance because I knew I needed to shift things around. But how to do that? Notecards? Spreadsheet?
Scrivener.
SO BACK IT GOES INTO SCRIVENER...
And I am glad of it. I LOVE the notecard feature! The Outliner, which takes from the notecards, is fabulous too. I'm now working my way through each chapter, moving parts around easily in the notecard section and adding blank ones for a few characters who need more. It seems like an awful lot of work for a book not finished, but being able to tell at a quick glance what is going on. I make the notecards different colors for the different characters, and use the status feature to point out which ones still need drafting. I added Scrivener for Ipad so I can haul it around with me and leave the computer behind.
I keep setting goals for this story, finished by X date, but I think now that I can say another five months and I will have the draft done. Finally. For real.
This story is consuming my life, and I love that, though I know I am starting to hermit a bit over it. But that is what I have missed so much--wanting to be totally immersed in a world. My last 2 books didn't really do that for me. They were a chore to write. Not this, not now. Getting ready to go to Seattle for a week too (Tuesday through the next Tuesday) and I'll have lots of time to work on it then.
And that is it for today's ramblings.
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