Do you set aside a time each day to write? Do you write five pages stream of consciousness then trim it down into something that makes sense? Are you a planner? Do you write in a notebook? Do you write once, edit once? write twice, edit once? Write once, edit thrice?
I don’t have a consistent process. I’ve been experimenting with writing in a basic markdown editor, maybe 500 words at a time, then stringing together multiple entries as best I can. What I find is I have lots of ideas and thoughts that are separate, and critical to my ability to form complex thought is correlating multiple seemingly unrelating things, which then creates a new more complicated and hybrid whole. I can’t sit down and write 5,000 words on one thing, but I can write 500 words on ten things, and then use that as the basis of a mosaic piece that (when edited well) comes together into a unique whole.
I was totally the same way when I wrote my first novel. I had the general flow of the story in my head with a few scenes, and somehow ended up with a 65k word manuscript just out of my head. It was a disjointed, poorly paced, poorly written, character arc-less, boring mess of a story.
It was a good learning experience though. I found out that I’m not a pantser. After learning some frameworks (Abbie Emmons on YouTube has some really helpful resources for Planners to use) and getting a full outline written, I’ve found writing my third novel to be so much easier.
I haven’t heard of Fabula cards, I’ll have to check it out. I’ve honestly just been using the sticky notes app on my Mac and the card-based overview in Scrivener.