Snowflake Method
It seems fitting to start talking about this method today during the first week of December. Because snow and such. Even if this has practically nothing to do with it.
So what is the snowflake method? Well even if you have a general idea for your plot, you're going to run into complications at some point that you need to have planned out. You know, before your protagonist's mother turns up live and cooking back home when you told your readers she was dead sixty pages ago. Or more simply, if your protagonists' eyes keep changing color or ages shift without explanation.
Here's how it works. Try writing your book in one sentence, like we practiced with the elevator pitch. Now try extended it into a paragraph. How about book blurb? What would you put on the back of your book cover? And now write an entire PAGE. But we're not done yet. You can apply this to all aspects of your story. Follow this system with your characters and with the beginning, middle and ending. Congratulations. You now have an entire, ridiculously detailed outline. Exactly like a snowflake--it appears to just be a white blur, but when you examine it closely, you see the finer details and how it is unique.
If you want to learn more about the snowflake method, please look at this entry below. It's probably much better than mine.
http://ypublish.blogspot.com/2012/12/the-snowflake-method.html
