Monday 16 January 2006

Fun with stationery

This is my plot board. A little tool I am test-running to help me keep all my story threads in one place. (Not enough room inside my head - vital information always leaks out).



I’ve tried keeping snippets of dialogue and story ideas in Word documents, but they get scattered all over my computer and sometimes it’s annoying to have to keep switching windows between the wip and my ideas sheet.

So, having discovered a huge cork board in my understairs cupboard before Christmas, I thought I would make use of it. I had recently used a trial copy of a story programme for writers that let me move little squares like index cards around on a time line. I liked the idea, but got fed up with not just being able to scribble something quickly on it.

So I went back to basics. I had some old index cards in a drawer (pink – got daughters’ approval) and as I started to plot out my new story I started pinning them on the board.

I’ll elaborate on how the whole thing works in the next post. I’m always fascinated by how other writers work, so I thought this might be of interest. If you find yourself nodding off, do feel free to do so. I will not be conducting a quiz to see who is paying attention.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Fiona, I love the idea of your plot board. Thanks for sharing.

Do you have different coloured cards for h and H POV? And...could you tell us how you've organised your ideas on the board.

I'm keen to try a similar kind of thing, but will probably need more than one board--maybe a cardboard concertina shape would work.

Janet

Unknown said...

Hi Fiona,

Glad to see you are working hard. The board is a great idea. Are you going to the RNA meeting tomorrow?
Cheers, Liz (from the conference:)

Fiona Harper said...

Hey Liz! Unfortunatley I can't go tomorrow, although I really wanted to.

Sharon J said...

What a brilliant idea!