How do you admisnister your next book? When I get ideas for my next story, I quickly think up scenes and conversations that I'll love to put in there. I have to plan and structure the storyline of my book otherwise it'll run off track, but often when I write the story seems to take a turn I hadn't planned because the turn simply feels more natural. This often makes the work I put into the skeleton redundant and the scenes and conversations might not really fit anymore. This makes me wonder, how do you plan and structure your book in order to avoid this?
I personally run a basic draft first - almost like purging. Then I do a Major rework and from that I will see what the strongest story is and what the secondary characters are doing.And then the actual editing starts.
If their is one thing/scene that I love but it won't work within the current story. I lift it out and file it in a new folder with a possible heading as the idea it can build into at a later point. It sounds like the most round about way of writing a longer story but it works for me. And, inadvertantly I will usually end up with two other half decent ideas for a short story or something at a later date.
I try not to hold myself hostage to one idea that I came up with it just may not suit this particular story. I know it sounds wasteful, but it was the only way I could come up with dealing with the problem while staying somewhat sane!
Hope that helps and Good Luck.
M.M. O' Toole