Note-taking for Fiction Writing

Photo © ots-photo | Deposit Photos

Before I go to the topic, please check out the Humorous Science Fiction and Fantasy book giveaway I’m participating in. Humor is hard for most writers to do, but when it’s done right, it’s great for readers. Onward!

This topic was inspired by a podcast from Asian Efficiency questioning the worthwhileness of note-taking apps. I’m going to extend into notes themselves, because the way we take notes may have problems.

For me, I’ve always roamed around, trying to find the “right way” to take notes, and store them. Toolwise, I’ve tried Evernote. Hugely turned off when they got bought out, discontinued any free options, and wanted to charge $17.99 a month. Pass. OneNote? Meh! It’s for school. Obsidian? No objections to it, nor am I in love with it. Then there’s MyBrain, which is like mind-mapping on steroids. But I found that typing short thoughts was, well, too short. (Writer. Duh.). So I’m sticking with paper.

Then there’s the note taking methods…

Everything, it seems like, is rooted in school. You know, take notes to study for tests. The digital Note-taking crowds claim that you dump all your notes into one place and the articles “write themselves” (hmm. Not the creator.).

All this comes from a book published in the Slip Box method. That’s a professor who kept index cards in a box and wrote an amazing number of academic papers. He passed away, and people went over his boxes, trying to understand his system. They couldn’t ask him, obviously, so they tried to derive the methods of how he did it. His method was like the MyBrain method I tried. Index cards would drive me crazy because I have to file and organize them. With Adaptability, I’m lucky if the cards get into the box…

But the one thing I see is that everyone talks about taking the notes, gives their method on the physical taking of the notes. That could be Cornell, PARA, mind mapping, etc. But they don’t really talk about the actual note-taking, other than capturing information. Usually this is for a variety of reasons, including losing out if the information disappears, or for ideas.

Me? When I tried Evernote, it turned into a junk drawer of random notes. I never went back to them to look up information. Granted, I’m high input, and I’m more likely to seek more on a topic because I may find something different.

However, I spend a lot of time learning about fiction writing. I’ve taken online courses, and I’ve also read craft books and sought old issues of The Writer Mag. I’m also going to 20Books Las Vegas—lots of workshops—and Superstars. Except for the craft information, everything else expires. A workshop I took on keywords is no longer valid because Amazon changed their system.

So I have notes on writing action scenes, writing a story set on a spaceship, emotions in fiction, the five senses, tags (not dialogue tags) and a lot more.

Yet, for what I’ve taken, I haven’t always taken notes on it. The first thing Dean Wesley Smith says for all his classes is to take notes and then refer to them later. And I watch the videos and don’t always take notes.

I’ve never really referred to my notes from writing classes, at least not very often. Once I take them, they mostly fall to the wayside.

Writing is a strange area. I just took the class on Show Vs. Tell, which was an interesting take on Depth. I took a few notes to help process my thinking on the topic.

For example, I liked the different examples of the five senses. They were very specific, and sometimes I need very specific to help me learn better. However, I also didn’t always agree with being that specific. Especially with taste. I don’t want my novel turning into Food Network. Just saying.

The pronoun discussion also had me thinking, because I had been pondering that topic previously. There was a blog post on first person and the problem with using too many “I” and particularly, sentences that start with the pronoun. I also remember reading Mickey Spillane, done in first person, and very few “I” in the story. Might have to revisit a few of those to investigate further.

So this circles me back to the question that no one has answered effectively: What is note taking for?

Is it for coming up with ideas? The writer in me says, no. It’s not that hard to come up with ideas. Though it looks enticing to people who struggle to find ideas. But that’s a more complex issue. Note taking won’t help without solving the underlying reasons coming up with ideas is a problem, and not with coming up with original ideas.

I can, however, see using notes to think about an idea. I’m doing that with a short story for the familiars story call. That’s instead of “just starting.” I may use none of what I think about (often the case), but it helps form a bridge to where I want to go.

Is it to keep information? Much has been made of a note taking system being a “Second Brain.”  You know, recording information so you don’t have to keep it in your brain. But if it’s not important enough to think about, then why would you store it?

And besides, if I’m taking the notes for writing, I should be using it, not storing it.

Is it to learn information? This one’s stickier. There are a lot of studies that apparently have been done, claiming that note taking doesn’t help as much as everyone believes. It’s multitasking and is hard to do. If you’re listening to a presentation on world building, you’re doing that, processing what’s important, and then writing it down. While more information is coming in.

Is it any wonder that people default to writing everything down?

Most of the resources, including Asian Efficiency, advise that you do a weekly review of your notes to “distill” them. I should note that many people use distillation and I don’t think they know exactly what it means. 😊It’s probably a metaphor, but the first thing this makes me think of is a still and moonshine, not refining notes. Okay……

But this advice focuses on capturing everything (like we’re in school) and then cleaning it up and revising them. All for something you’re supposed to dump out of your mind so you don’t have to think about it…?

We haven’t gotten out of school for notes.

The first step is to be picky about what we want to save. It shouldn’t be everything (high input grumbles here: “I want to collect it ALLLLL!”).

That’s the hardest thing I’m finding in studying the craft. What’s important? All of it—without a doubt—is opinion. One person says five senses every five words. Another says at the very least touch, sight, hearing. Still another lists the order they should appear in. (The only thing everyone agrees on for this is that it immerses the reader in the character.)

So the notes become a way to assess the information. You can write down this author says one sense per page and three emotions and if you agree with him. And why or why not, which is very important. Because that helps with figuring out your opinion.

Because you can disagree. Or disagree in part. Or be not sure. I’ve now heard many ways of doing the five senses and I’m not sure what I agree with. Of course, I’m still thinking about it.

The notes can also be a way to process how you would try out the skill. Sometimes I’m in the middle of a conference and a comment from the panelist takes me down a path where I’m writing ideas for the story.

Maybe note taking isn’t about collecting and keeping information. Maybe it’s about thinking.