Outline October - Tumblr Posts
Ominous / Outline October 2024 Announcement Post:
The poll about Ominous October prompts has now wrapped up, and the results are in!
51% voted to used the narrowed list of polls, while 25% wanted to vote to narrow down the prompts, and the other % had no opinion.
So! We've got two (three?) options for those participating in Ominous October 2024 :)
Ominous October 2024 *Weekly Short Stories* - Writing 714 words each day, complete one short story each week totaling 5k (or more) based on the following prompts:
Week One: Undead / Strange Town
Week Two: Changeling / Curse
Week Three: Parasitism / Revenge
Week Four: Transformation / Eternity
[You can choose between either prompt for the week, or combine them both in your story!]
Ominous October 2024 *Daily Short Stories OR Poetry*- each day, write a drabble/short story or poem based on the following prompts:
Raised from the dead
Ghost stories
“I put a spell on you”
Replacement and parasitism (changelings, cuckoos, All About Eve)
Victim turns the tables on their bully
Playing pretend or acting out on stage turns real
Medical abuse and sadistic doctors
Phantom limb
A single candle
Costume
Under the bed
What lurks in the cellar
The weird small-town
A knock at the door
The witching hour
It will never end
Graveyard ghost hunting
Misty road
Potions
Harvesting
Banshee's lullaby
Crooked reflection
"Do not speak its name"
The eleventh hour
It's too late
Bones itching
Poisoned coffee
Bloody hands
Since October is right before November, and a lot of people are going for the 30,000 words in a month goal, there are three catch-up/rest days from the 29th through the 31st!
On the 31st, Everyone picks one (or more!) spooky stories to post to celebrate!
Here is a template for Ominous October:
Please feel free to make your own custom decorated goal cards and post them in the Ominous October tags!
And don't forget to reblog for more reach! Everyone participating has around two weeks to do any prep they'd like for the weekly short stories with the prompts :D
If you would prefer to focus on Novella November Prep, there's also:
Outline October 2024
Where you spend the month outlining, doing research, making character designs, world-building, etc!
Is there a prep calendar available? Like for the proceeding month of an event that outlines the weekly prep stages, such as outlining, character development, etc.
ooh, not yet, but that is a good idea! I was gonna make a post asking everyone what kind of things they would like to do for Outline October -- the prep alternative/supplament to Ominous October.
I saw that a lot of people on my poll here are pretty much planning on winging it, but if anyone has some more concrete, organized way to inspire Outline October, let me know!
While typing this up I opened up paint and threw this together "quick": (it was about an hour between distractions lol)
This isn't going to be another "you hate fanfiction!!" because very obviously you do not, but it is prompted by the discussion of branching out into original work, since it's something I often struggle with when trying to make that jump. Do you or any of your followers have any good resources on beginner worldbuilding? I really struggle with it.
Thank you!
If you check out my post where I made a "Prep Calendar" for Outline October (Which is a November-prep alternative/ supplement to Ominous October, the spooky short story event), I actually made a rather rough calendar outline of how to go about world building in advance for November;
The basic first steps for me are usually just three things:
Who are your characters
What kind of world do they live in (aka setting)
Whats your main plot/conflict?
To start worldbuilding at its lowest level, start with number one and work your way up; figure out what kind of character you'd like to write, where they live, and go from there!
Here is the prep calendar I threw together in MS paint, I definitely reccomend downloading it on desktop to actually zoom in to see what all it says lol.
And as a bonus, I will even make a fun, silly little exercise for anyone who'd like to get some practice in!
If you want to join in, grab a pen and pencil, or open up your favorite note-taking app :D
Here we go....!
Let's start out by saying that my basic concept for a character is *spins mental wheel of random ideas*....... a talking deer! 1) So now that I have decided that I want a talking deer character, now I have to decide: A) do *all*deer talk? B) Do *all* animals? C) Or is it just this one singular deer who is special? 2) If it *is* just this one singular deer who can talk, are they: D) otherwise a perfectly normal deer who just happens to be able to talk? E) Can they talk because they used to be human? F) Can they talk because they used to be an Alien or encountered Alien Tech (scifi) ? G) Can they talk because they used to be a Magical Creature or ran into a Magical Spell (fantasy) ? 3) Now you get to decide, mostly if you chose A or B from #1 but also useful for C : H) Is your story a more personal nature documentary, with realistic interactions between predators and prey? I) Is your story going to be a unique world where deer have built a society with technology and know how to defend themselves from predators? J) Is your story a unique world where all animals can talk and are equally sentient, therefore predators are revered as gods or keepers of the dead, who bring all back to the circle of life and prevent the spread of illness and disease, with older animals proudly going "to the wolves" to give their life to their brethren who consecrate the bones of the dead and keep resources plentiful? K) Or are predators the monsters in the dark, the teeth that bite, the slavering jaws that kill to live and *cannot live any other way*, so has learned not to regret? L) Or even, predators who feed from the already-dead when they can, and eat their fill of berries, nuts and fruits when they cannot, because they do not wish to take the lives of others for their own sake?
*clears throat* ahem. Drama done (can you see why I love worldbuilding) ,
go ahead and pick a letter from each of the above options, and jot them down on your paper or note-taking app.
You now have: A basic character, their backstory, and a basic setting!
From three-ish questions from a basic idea, you can spawn multiple possibilities, each of which can branch off into their own unique iterations!
Here's a few more, if you'd like to continue the exercise as further practice:
What is your deer's name?
What do they look like / what kind of deer are they? (deer of various species are found over almost the entire world, so there is tons of variety! :D )
What kind of world do they live in?
How do they interact with humans?
*are* there humans in your story?
What kind of zany or terrifying adventures would your talking deer and a human go on?
What kind of adventures would your talking deer go on with other deer or other animals?
How does your deer get along with other species?
Do they have friends from other species?
Do they have rivals from other species?
Do they have *sworn enemies* from other species?
Do they have a *love interest* from another species?
etc!
I am hoping this game/exercise is helpful, my brain being both autistic and ADHD means I am, at the drop of a hat, ready to start spouting more and more ideas sparked from a single concept at any given moment!
And yes, if you did this exercise, please feel free to use your deer character in a story, draw art of your deer character, etc!
If this exercise was helpful to you or fun, please feel free to tag any deer creations with "NovellaDeer" , I'd love to see them!
You can easily adapt this exercise to any story concept you need to worldbuild; pick what basic idea you have for a main character, and start asking yourself questions about them and their circumstances, and let yourself come up with multiple, contradicting answers for each question; the more the merrier!
After you've decided which starting answers you like the most, you can work your way down the list, asking follow-up questions, and before you know it you will have your very own original character :D
And do not feel like you need to keep your character exactly the way they start out as; characters evolve over time, and you may find yourself changing their "base" character to suit your story or to suit your tastes as you get more experienced with writing and world building!
woops, turned out you have to refresh the pinned tabs for the countdowns for them to update properly lol.
Today's corrected (refreshed) countdowns:
8 days, 23 hours til Ominous (&/or Outline) October!
39 days, 23 hours til Novella November!
Today's countdown:
6 says, 21 hours til Ominous/Outline October!
37 days, 21 hours til Novella November!
Today's very belated countdown at 11 o clock at night now that the power is back on (but I can't currently use my computer)
3 days, 10 hours til Outline/Ominous October!
34 days, 10 hours til Novella November!
I *think* my computer is working again so tomorrow I'll post the new countdown in the morning.
Only 2-ish days til Ominous/Outline October!
1 day left til Ominous / Outline October !
If you need a basic framework to start outlining your novel, you can start with just a few bullet points and slowly expand it from there:
How does your story open, aka, what are the opening scenes?
...
Where does the main plot start is your novel aka What brings your main character into the main drama?
...
What is the climax of your story?
...
How does your story close out, aka, what are the last few scenes?
Now that you've decided on these four base points, you can now slowly but surely fill in the blanks in between each of these!
Decide how your story opens, and how your main character gets pulled into the main plot, then start deciding what happens in between those two points --
-- you're going to need to do some build up, and get your readers invested or interested in your character before they get pulled into the drama, but you also don't want to wait until halfway into your novel to actually start the plot; so, decide what you want your opening chapter to be, and sprinkle in some foreshadowing for the larger plot as you are introducing your characters and setting, then spring into the action in the next chapter or two!
If you need some help visualizing and don't want to draw by hand, I also recommend using a character creator, such as Hero Forge to design your characters and give you some kind of visual reference
Ominous / Outline October 2024 Day 1
Happy Ominous / Outline October!
For Ominous October, your challenge it to write at least 714 words (or more) per day, to write a 5k word short story each week! There's also an option to just write daily drabbles of 714 or more words as well.
This first week's prompt is "Undead / Strange Town"
Alternatively, today's Daily Prompt is "Raised from the Dead"
If you are participating in Outline October instead, now is your sign to start outlining and planning your story for Novella November!
If you don't have a concrete idea of who your main character is yet, now is the time to start brainstorming and designing :)
A good first step for outlining is figuring out what you want the opening pages of your story to be, how you want the main plot to start, and what happens between those two points, and work your way outward from there :)