I don’t have a clue (although I have read books and articles and weblogs) as to how many writers write in the same method, but I tend to start from an opening paragraph and try to make it into a story from there. The opening lines ALWAYS remain the opening lines. Unless I’m convinced by my betters of a better place to start.
Then I proceed in random spurts to unwind a story some guy in my head is hollering out. Sometimes he falls asleep for days. Sometimes I check and he’s died.
I’m one who keeps rereading it as I go, making small changes or correcting or improving grammar and diction and tense. Then I normally can go on from there for a while and then stop.
Big Tim Dawson has lived in my head for I believe less than a week, but he has demanded all of my time. Oddly enough, this time I had parts of the ending, or parts out of sequence and I usually highlight those in some color like blue then work in a plotted out structure until I hit those bits and if ready, reconstruct them, change them to black type, and move on from there. Along with the working story in black, and the various scenes in blue, I have red text that give direction or concept that may or may not be integrated once I see how the story lays out and where it decided to go.
Well. Just a few minutes ago I eliminated all the blue, all the red words, and have what I can consider a rough first draft (linked here and in the top right sidebar). I can call the story complete, but the manuscript really is not. Now to the real work.
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology
I think every writer has their own game they play with the process. I once read that Kurt Vonnegut didn’t move on to the next page until the one he was on was perfect to him!
}:)
“Sometimes he falls asleep for days. Sometimes I check and he’s died.”
I think that part is true of every writer. But I’ve found that each story has its own genesis. From a character, a setting, an event, even a theme, and sometimes a dream. Sometimes a little of each.