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Switched from planning every chapter to just writing and it saved my novel

For months I was stuck outlining my fantasy story set in Portland, planning out every scene in advance. Then I read a post from someone who said they just started writing with a vague idea and fixed it later. I tried that method and finished 3 chapters in one week instead of staring at outlines. Has anyone else found that less planning actually made their writing faster?
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dianawilson
Wait, did you also have that moment where you realized you were basically trying to write the book twice for no reason? I spent like 2 months on a detailed outline for my urban fantasy and ended up scrapping 90% of it anyway once I actually started typing. For me, the trick was writing a single sentence about what needed to happen in the chapter, then just going for it. It's way faster because you're not second-guessing every little detail before you even know if it works. Now I just use a bullet list of like 3 big moments per chapter and let the rest sort itself out in the edit lol.
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david_walker97
Yeah @dianawilson, that bullet list trick sounds way more doable than what I was doing with my plot.
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milalewis
milalewis11d ago
bullet lists aren't gonna save anyone from bad writing though
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