As readers of this blog already know, Jeff Abbott, bestselling author of suspense titles Panic and Fear, uses Clairefontaine notebooks to sketch out his works in progress. Here, Jeff answers a couple questions about his methodology.
On your blog, you mentioned that you use notebooks to keep track of ideas that occur to you while writing, to sketch scenes, outline plot points, and so on… is this something you do systematically, or just whenever inspiration strikes? Do you organize your notebooks according to project (i.e., a specific novel or screenplay) or by theme (characters, research, plots)?
Each novel starts in its own Clairefontaine notebook, and serves as a catchall for ideas as they come to me. I don’t try to organize it overmuch (with separate sections for characters, plot points, etc.), except I do keep a running list of research issues and questions. If I do need a separate section I mark it with a durable index tab from Post-It. Those are easily labeled and removed when I don’t need them any more. But pretty much, ideas get written into the notebook as they come to me. So one page might be the initial sketch for a character’s background, and the next might be an idea for a scene that involves a different character. That’s okay. This approach provides a map or diary to see how the book evolved. For other projects that aren’t books, I keep a small pocket notebook with me all the time, and notes about those ideas, or any ideas non-book-related go in there. If an idea evolves into a bigger project (such as writing a film treatment for a studio), then the project graduates to its own Clairefontaine notebook. I label the front of each notebook so I know what’s covered inside at a glance. Right now I have active notebooks for the new novel I’m writing, one for short stories, and for a film project I’m involved with.
I don’t want to “overorganize” the notebooks—there is a lot of value in flipping through the pages, revisiting ideas as the book evolves, and seeing what I originally planned and how the book turned out.
