Reverse Outline Your Novel Drafts In Minutes
Turn your foreign and forgotten chapters into a high-level outline in minutes.
Have you ever written something of value?
Trick question, right?
But think of something you didn't finish and poured your soul into.
Something you just couldn't let go of.
Like a NaNoWriMo draft.
50 000 words of bottle excitement and hyped-up dreams.
But now months later, after giving that steaming word pile the space it needed to grow foreign. Foreign enough to edit. You realise you’ve lost touch with it.
You find yourself asking — “Just what exactly did you write?”
But now the mountain isn't simply editing it, but getting to know the damn thing again, reacquainting yourself with the words. Finding the path in the forest.
Loading all of those words back into your working memory so the simulation of the story becomes malleable in your mind. Again.
Usually, this means reading your whole damn novel again.
Ouch.
Maybe more than once. Which for me means getting it onto my Kindle. Taking notes, getting the notes off my Kindle, distilling them and getting them into a Notion outline.
Just so I can start editing.
And this kids, is why I have six unedited Nano novels.
(Yes, I’m learning to outline now. Because I’m too old for this shit. But I still want to mine those old novels and my recent draft for clarity and stories.)
What’s that I hear?
The sounds of angels singing of what could save us time.
Enter Reverse Outlining
It’s in situations like this, with big chunks of foreign-feeling text. When time is short and I just want to get to the re-writing.
That I've found reverse outlining comes in handy.
And this is how you do it.
Let's dive in!
Perfect for discovery writers
This is most useful for discovery writers but could help anyone check what they’ve actually written against what they think they’ve written.
Sometimes you think you’ve written something that expresses the complex nature of the human condition, only to see you’ve written about a bum sitting in a dumpster setting bits of trash on fire.
Again this prompt can help with that.
It’s a second opinion on the subtextual meaning of what you’ve put down on the page.
The Basic Reverse Outline Prompt
I’ve switched to creating prompts that work in vanilla and free ChatGPT to make things as low-cost, simple and easy for you as possible.
To kick off this prompt I get ChatGPT to confirm it understands and ask you to paste your chapter to continue.
Future prompts will use this Q&A multistep approach that I’ve developed while researching other prompt engineer’s processes.
I want you to be an award winning developmental editor, like Shawn Coyne, and guide me through the improvement of my serial fiction chapter.
Help me reverse outline by distilling what this chapter is about.
1. A one short thematic & narrative paragraph, what's the point of this chapter. What does it do for the story as a whole?
2. Give me 5 short bullets of what's literally happens
3. A succinct paragraph of what happens sub-textually, highlight any noticeable themes.
4. What stage of the Vogler's version of the Hero's Journey does this represent?
If you understand, say yes, and ask me to to paste in my chapter.
I pasted this chapter of A Slave to Memory into the message box and hit Submit
.
ChatGPT’s Output
Here’s the reply I received.
I’ve added the headings to show how this helps me as a writer.
Why this chapter matters
This chapter delves into Murph's memories of his past and his connection to his new family. It sets the stage for his character development and his motivations for fighting against the corruption in the city.
What happens on the surface?
Murph and Omni merge into a single entity in a dream world, experiencing Murph's memories. Murph remembers his colorful home in Bokaap and his new family. He brings home a book for Viniah and searches for Jessalyn, finding her in a plant-filled courtyard with another man.
What is happening beneath the surface?
Sub-textually, this chapter highlights the importance of family and connection in a world full of corruption and chaos. Murph's memories of his home and his new family serve as an anchor in a turbulent time, reminding him of what he is fighting for. The presence of the other man in the courtyard hints at possible romantic tension between Murph and Jessalyn.
Hero’s Journey
This chapter represents the "Ordinary World" stage of Vogler's version of the Hero's Journey, where the hero is introduced in their everyday life before the adventure begins.
Reflection
I found this process incredibly calming, exciting and fulfilling because it removed a lot of the creative doubt I had about my story.
For example, the Hero’s Journey stage coming up as Ordinary World validated what I had been thinking and aiming for.
As I’m learning this structuring method, and complicating the hell out of it in this story by using three threads, it was great to know it “reads” as the stage I intended it to.
Give this prompt a try the next time you don’t feel you remember what you’ve written or when you’re uncertain your subtext is reading right.
If you have any questions or suggestions drop them in a comment, I’ve had some great conversations with readers and I read and reply to every one.
If you found this helpful and easy non-pay way to support me and The Reader Experience is to share this with a friend or two. It’s the number one way we grow.
Until next week — happy writing!
Ready to Level Up?
Hop over the paywall for the revised prompt.
It’s nearly 40 lines long
Tailors the output to specific word lengths
Uses an example to help ChatGPT zero in on what we want out
These revisions took at least 20 rounds of testing and would conservatively save you around 3-5 hours you can rather spend on your writing.
Bonus: the Midjourney prompt for this post, with a teaser for upcoming posts.
Revised Prompt
ChatGPT output needs to be actionable, so in using the first version of the prompt I realised quickly that it became overwhelming when viewed in a table.
This version of the prompt gives specific instructions to keep things concise.
Because I write serial fiction it rates my hook and cliffhanger.
I want you to be an award winning developmental editor, like Shawn Coyne, and guide me through the improvement of my serial fiction chapter.
Help me reverse outline by distilling what this chapter is about.
- 25 word single sentence summary
- 5 short bullet outline of what literally happens
- 35 words on the subtext and themes
- 10 words describing the Opening Hook (Rating out of 5)
- 10 words describing the Cliffhanger. (Rating out of 5)
- What stage of the Chris Vogler's Hero's Journey does this match most?
Please format your answer like this example:
Murph gathers his team to plan a heist to retrieve memories and seek revenge against those who killed Gabe and Jess, but they are attacked by a ghost in the early hours of the morning.
- Murph presents the plan to the team and assigns roles
- Magda questions involving Vinn, a teenage girl, in the heist
- The team is attacked by a ghost in the early hours of the morning
- Murph confirms the plan will proceed as scheduled
- Vinn agrees to take on the role of a grease man
The themes of this chapter include revenge, justice, and sacrifice. The characters are seeking to avenge the deaths of loved ones while acknowledging the risks and potential harm to themselves. The idea of memories and the importance of remembering them is also present.
Opening Hook: 3/5 - The chapter starts with a continuation of the plan from the previous chapter, but the tension and stakes are raised with the introduction of the ghost attack.
Cliffhanger: 4/5 - The chapter ends with the team under attack and the unknown threat of the ghost, leaving readers wondering what will happen next.
This part of the story matches the "approach to the inmost cave" stage of the Hero's Journey, as the characters prepare for a final confrontation with their enemies.
If you understand, say yes, and ask me to to paste in my chapter.
Let me know if you want a Notion Template, to help pull all this together into a single view across your chapters.
Midjourney Prompt
A robot [helpful, friendly, yellow] drawing a blueprint on paper [purple paper, white lines] by Laurie Greasley --ar 3:2 --s 750 --v 5.1
Teasers
Visual Style Guide from North Star
In an upcoming article, I’ll share my process for coming up with a North Star, a focal point and guiding light in your business or writing project.
Following that I’ll also show what I’m doing at the moment —using my North Star for The Reader Experience to help zero in on a visual style for my posts so I can get a brand look while developing my Midjourney skills for cover and concept art
Super Secret Project
I’m working on a way to plan and structure my future posts along a user journey (our journey building a fiction empire! 🧐) that ends in a design book for writers.
Working Title:
Liar By Design: How to build a reader-centric writing empire.
I’m trying to tell myself I’m not starting Yet Another Project, but adding structure to my current project while keeping the end in mind.
Happy empire building and thank you for supporting my work,
Zane 👋