What is my writing process?
Well, for starters, I consider myself somewhere between a knitter and a pantser. That means that i come up with ideas on the spot. That also means that I do not write in order. I write different scenes as they come to me and piece them together later on.
For the first 58,000 words I did not rely on an outline.
Since I've been writing the story as I go, I really did not have a predetermined direction that I wanted my story to go. All I had was a starting point and simply winged it based on ideas as they came to me. But, as the story progressed, things got a little hazy. I draw a lot of blanks and struggled with ideas not having a clear, solid outline in the beginning. When that happens to me, I kept rereading and and editing relevant scenes until something clicked.
Eventually, I decided that I needed to keep track of where I've been and what I covered, so that I could have a clearer picture of where I could go. So, I created a bullet list of events for each chapter. Yeah, it's kind of like an outline but not for the entire story. I still do not have an outline for the entire book, but having smaller groups make it easier to work with.
Another thing that I do, other than research ever single thing that comes to mind, is write with two MS Word windows going at once. Left side displays the ideas and chapter outlines; The right is the manuscript.
It's been working fairly well this way.
When I m working on a chapter, I used to just dive right in. But now I find myself writing the dialogue first. As a scene unfolds in my head, I write down all of the dialogue. I leave out all of the small details and fluff, like "he said" and/or facial expressions or descriptions of motions. I leave that until I am done framing the dialogue. I just put who is speaking and what is said. sometimes, if I am inspired to do so, I write an action
Guy - blah blah
dude - blah blahhh
Guy - blah blah blalablah
And so on.
After which, I start editing the sentences and adding in my expressions like "Oh, you’re injured. You poor thing," she says in a sympathetic tone."
After I have a solid idea of what is going on in the chapter, I start fleshing it out by describing the setting(s) and/or how the subjects are affected by the surroundings.
When the chapter is somewhat finished, I comb through it and make necessary changes until I am satisfied with the outcome.
That is pretty much how I have been going about it the last handful of chapters.