Make A Punch List!

Disclaimer first—I do not consider myself a professional anything, so my suggestions and tips should be taken as just one more person on the internet sharing his personal opinion based on his own experiences.  These tips and ideas may work for you too, but they may not.  Just saying.

Writing Tip #021  

When I’m writing, I’m always looking ahead.  I usually have the beginning, middle and end planned out before I even begin the first page.  That being said, there are still a lot of story points still needing to be added to make the story complete.  These story points can be anything from a simple comment or point of reference—maybe a foreshadowing to an entire scene in the story.  Sometimes, the entire idea for the book may have even stemmed from picturing one of these scenes in your head.  Especially when writing a mystery, all these story points add up to a lot to keep track of.  Over the course of writing the whole book, if you don’t have a sharp mind, by the time you get to a key scene, it’s easy to forget maybe just a small detail of something you really wanted to add.  That’s where my punch list comes in.

This isn’t a breakthrough idea or anything, (Really, it’s just a list.) but if you’re not going to outline your work, I would highly suggest it.  I make a list, a “punch list,” of these scenes in a separate document.  I usually title it, “Things to add.”  I don’t consider this an outline, because for me, the list usually isn’t in any order.  I start the list when I begin writing and add to it as I go along.  Sometimes I will note something I plan to write in a future scene, other times it will be a note to make a change in a past scene which is already written.  The idea is that when the first draft is completed, I can go back and check my list and utilize it in my editing. 

One other thing I’ve found the list useful for is curing writer’s block.  If I’m stumped on moving forward with a scene, I reference my punch list for changes or additions to be made to a previous scene.  I’ve found working on previous scenes to be a great seed starter for getting the words on the page again. 

As always, this is just something that works for me.  If it’s not your thing, that’s cool.  I’d be happy to hear how you keep track of your story in the comments!  Happy Reading!