The reason I write without an outline is because, honestly, an outline would spoil all the fun for me. It would ruin the excitement, the joy, and the surprises of writing and turn it into work.

The best memory I have that can show the joy and enjoyable chaos of writing as a panster comes from the first draft of book 3 of my trilogy, which I wrote back in 2012/2013.

(this will be spoiler free).

I was maybe 25% of the way through the first draft. I had no idea what would happen, because, well, panster.

I got to a scene where the villain, Evant Linstrom, was explaining his motivation to another character. I just let him talk. I knew what he needed to say, in the moment, and he said it.

But the whole time I was typing, my heart was in my throat and my stomach was in knots.

Linstrom, what are you doing? Linstrom! You’re ruining everything! How am I possibly going to work with this?!?! What is going ON!?

You see, Linstrom had a grudge. Against a character I knew very well–a character who certainly wasn’t perfect, but was a good person. Who wouldn’t do what Linstrom was accusing this person of doing.

And yet, I knew Linstrom’s grudge was genuine. It had to be. It just . . . it was legitimate and real. I understood that. Linstrom was NOT lying when he was saying all this stuff that ten minutes before I had no idea he was going to be saying.

So, I let Linstrom talk. Then I walked around the room and bit and started thinking. Within five minutes, I understood what was going on. I understood what had happened. I realized how Linstrom had an actual grudge, yet that character whose character I didn’t want to tarnish (and who, honestly it wouldn’t make sense to tarnish) was not responsible in the way Linstrom thought.

I was STUNNED. Absolutely stunned. It was a great set up for the story, helped me see some aspects of what would come next, and, most of all, I realized how previous installments had PERFECTLY set me up for this, unconsciously on my part. The set up was there for a great twist that I had had no idea was coming.

The fact is, my best plot twists have come to me like that: while writing, when I reach them, with no previous suspicion of them on my part.

The truth is, I don’t think my stories would be nearly as interesting or even as complex if I tried to outline. I would overthink everything in an outline, and my thought process would work completely differently than it does when I just let myself write and let my characters be who they are.

I’m hoping to eventually re-release books two and three of my trilogy in second editions, but to do that, I’ll need people to support book one. If you like sword and sorcery, fantasy, or just a good action-adventure, please check out book one: The Crimson League: The Fight for Hope, on sale now at Amazon.

The book’s website is amazing. Check it out here.