As of writing, I am 10,505 words into my second WIP. I’m really excited about this because I’m ‘pantsing’ my way through this novel, something I’m very nervous about. For those unfamiliar with the term, it’s a way of saying I’m ‘flying by the seat of my pants’ through this book, I didn’t outline it. I’m a big proponent for outlining. I feel it’s the only way I got through my first WIP. For this reason, I have an outline for NaNo and I feel confident about getting the 50,000 words in because I know if I get stuck, I can move on to my next plot point and pick up, avoiding the ‘dead end’ feeling. I was scared that with this pantsing exercise I would trap myself in corners and end up crying at my desk over my lost path to a coherent ending.
However, I feel confident saying ‘so far, so good’ about WIP2. I’ve introduced my main characters, given them a voice, and am following a coherent timeline. I’ve even started introducing major plot points and developing the mindset of my world (it’s slightly Sci-Fi). I see the end of my exposition in sight and my inciting incident is planned for soon in the future.
Readers, I’m curious about your technique. Are you a pantser or a planner? Have you tried both? If so, which works best for you?
Have a great day!
Taking On a World of Words 
I an a pantser. I tried outlining a few times, but the outline ends up trapping me. Mentally, at least. I panic with the outline, if I write a scene then it can’t go away from that. The last three novels I have written are all pants. My NaNo exploded from 3k words last night to 14k today, I added nothing but fleshing out the skeleton.
Happy writing!
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I’ve thrown in a few scenes I didn’t plan on but for the most part I’m sticking to my outline. Best of luck!
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