Should I Write First to Last/Beginning to End?

First and foremost, before you begin writing, you have done several months of research, planning, and outlining. See my blog: How to Write a Book

Today is the day that you have calendared as the day you begin to write your manuscript. Do you write start to finish?

Yes, it is preferred that you write beginning to end. You have researched, plotted, and written your outline. You probably know how your plot is going to unfold, you may even see the end of your story, but you are not there yet. Hold that thought and…begin writing the first chapter.

Writing is a glorious dance between the author and the plot. At points, the author will lead, using your outline, and sometimes the plot will lead, unfolding itself as it goes, veering into an undiscovered territory almost on its own.  

The further I get into writing the first draft of my manuscript, the more the plot and the characters become real to me. I begin to feel what they are feeling. Yet, I am not ready to write something three chapters ahead. I am courting my characters, easing them into their plot. I am working up to it, scene by scene, like a movie.

A good reason that we write start to finish is because we are creating. It is a process. And sometimes our creation will be plot-led. Other times, it will be character-led.

Two examples:

Author-led. When I began writing Under the Roof, I knew there was a point where the Absent Nun, Abigail, would take off her habit and begin wearing street clothes. It was a poignant point in the manuscript, and I couldn’t wait to write it. But I waited to get there. The anticipation of that moment enhanced my writing about her in earlier chapters. I knew where I wanted to take Abigail, and I spent time creating circumstances that would lead to the shedding of her habit.

And when that day came, on page 244 of 281 pages. After 243 pages of the reader becoming fully invested in the Absent Nun in her habit, fully committed to her life as a nun, the big reveal came. What a fun moment to write.

Character/plot-led. Yet, in my latest novel, Meet the New Neighbors, two characters were destined to fall in love. I created them and set them up to, at some point, gaze into each other’s eyes and go in for a slow, deliberate kiss. I wrote their backstory, had them meet a few times, but every time I got them together in the manuscript, it just didn’t feel right. I had to pivot. They became plot- or character-driven, and there was no first kiss to be had. How did I discover that? I was writing from the beginning to the end, and my characters determined their own path.

 A note to my nonfiction authors: I feel that the outline for nonfiction is more tightly mapped out. You may already have chapter headings, and there is a definite, calculated direction that you are going. And, many times, an interview or revealing research may lead you to write the fifth chapter first. Take that opportunity while the material is fresh in your mind.

The emotion of the writer and the characters often leads fiction.

Nonfiction is led by the research and the calculated way it is presented. Yet, I am not against some compelling finds and emotional twists in a nonfiction manuscript.

Either way, research, plot, outline, and write start to finish. It will give you a better-organized, less complicated first manuscript.