October Novel Prep Challenge

So...I might have mentioned I'm prepping a different story than the one I'm writing next month. I couldn't send that one through Prep because it's already prepped; every character has a bio and ever chapter has its own outline, so I know what I need to know about it. I just want to use next month to finish my half of the thing (and maybe some of my partner's if she falls too far behind).

All that being said, I absolutely couldn't skip Prep. I *like* Prep an awful lot and find a great many of its challenges very rewarding. For a story like the one I'm finishing next month, it is spot on perfect! But this year, as I'm not writing next month, I'm basically world-building and databasing...so this thing is just the organizational tool I need.

For FtG (yup, I'm at abbreviations now!), I find that the bios and backgrounds are turning out to be the most helpful. They're direct and focused, which is exactly the sort of thing I need. I agree with Brandi that the demographics challenge is super important, as well; knowing I'm writing for an educated adult (gender and ethnicity fluid, with perhaps an edge toward white males because it's fantasy) with an interest in history, mythology, and/or epic fantasy lets me know how far I can take this. People who like their authors to put obvious research into their world will love this.

For me--and this stretches over most of my solo projects--it's the more open-ended and broad prompts that throw me. I need direction or my brain will go blank and I end up working on something that isn't really what I needed. Brainstorming the other day turned into a discussion with myself over whether Moira would actually wear what I'd put her in, or if she'd wear something more Eastern in memory of her mother. In the end, no...she wears Western stuff. Do I know more about the plot? Nope. The world? No. *sigh*

I'm also not great with trying to nail down timelines or chronologies as things tend to change as I write.

Oh! Fireworks time! Yay! I've rambled long enough for fighting autocorrect.
-Quaddy

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