I find that making a general outline of a story is helpful to me. An outline especially lends direction to a book’s beginning momentum. However, my outlines are not rigid―they are simply a guide―a living document that I can adjust at any point in the process. I rely on my instinctive feelings while authoring a story which lends me freedom to deviate from my original outline. Elements I didn’t know beforehand now become chapters and thus cause outline adjustments. The last chapter of Rembrandt, Vermeer, Degas still Missing was nearly fully written long before I reached the end. The result caused me to rethink those parts between my writings up to that point and the final chapter. I have found that forcing a book down a path does not work for me. Trying to salvage the time and words I’ve already dedicated to a story becomes an exhausting task. So for me, an outline is essential no matter how basic it begins―and then…I let it breathe.
Writing fiction isn't about lying through your teeth, but more like fibbing with a little class. ― Anthony Mays