John Grisham on How He Outlines His Chapters While Writing

hey i've gotta i've gotta i always try to do one writer's question uh to get the insight from the greatest writers that ever lived but you said that you never start a book without knowing how it's gonna end you also say that you're going to you that you chart out your book uh chapter by chapter but if you individualize that chapter by chapter how much do you have a entry point into the chapter and then an exit point and then whatever comes comes or you pretty much how detailed do you get in your outline well uh the chapter outline is usually one paragraph uh what's going to happen next what's going to happen in this chapter or a couple of sentences three sentences maybe uh you do that to to pacing is so crucial you've got you i'm always concerned with pacing and so to do that you've got to know what's in the chapters and uh are they too long too short whatever uh it's a there's a constant uh uh challenge every day is uh how long do you keep a chapter when do you break it up when do you give the reader a break when do you switch scenes completely or go to a different subplot um that's why the outlining is so important because you got to work that stuff out ahead of time before you start the book because if you if you know if you always know where you're going it's hard to get lost and writers are notorious for having a brilliant idea jumping into the novel writing like crazy for a year and then realize they they don't want to go where to go next and that or what the end is and they've written themselves into a corner that is fairly common in this business and i'm just i'm not going to do that i want to know what the ending is and so i keep the chapter summaries fairly succinct and uh and i'm always uh tinkering with them once i have the outline finished it doesn't stay like that i'll start the book if the outline works i'll start the book but i'm always tinkering with the outline too uh it gets bigger and bigger and bigger and by the time it's finished i can't even read the thing it's so messy but that's uh that's how i handle that

Channel: Reed's

Views: 49,393

Keywords: John Grisham, John Grisham Interview, Reed's, John Grisham's Sooley, Sooley

Id: mGeDe1PtJOM

Length: 2min 11sec (131 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 30 2021