Exercise for the day: Nine-box visual outline

Here's an interesting method of outlining from Benjamin Hale, sent to me by a student in today's class: It's a nine-box visual outline which can be found along with some other thoughts on structure in

this blog post

Some people like to make outlines early in the process, some after a draft or several are already written and the structure needs visualizing/tweaking. The earlier in the process you do it, the more likely it is that your actual story, when you write it, will go off the grid. You can't use your intellect to come up with the perfect idea and then force your characters to follow this exactly. But an outline is a great tool to get a snapshot of the shape of your story as you understand it at the moment-- whether that moment is part of the first draft or the revision process. (I strongly recommend the latter! But everybody is different.)

Try this with your story. Don't let it eat up your writing time for the day. Set the timer for 20 minutes (or even 10), chart as much as you can, then move on.