One of the most interesting and frustrating parts of writing a story is when your characters get into a conversation and that discussion goes down a path you hadn’t intended.
Now, I am what I think most people refer to as a plantser. I plan as well as write from the seat of my pants. This means that when I start a new story I have a beginning and an end. It’s what is in between that isn’t often planned. This is where conversations between characters can take a twist or even find a new plot in a story. It can also be used to bring to fore a problem a writer hadn’t seen before – basically, I call it my subconscious writing on its own.
Some scenes do this. even. A lot of the scenes in Dark Dimensions weren’t planned. There were some that were planned, but a great many weren’t. I’d like to think they enhanced the overall story and enriched the characters. Same with Consequences. A great deal of that came from just sitting and writing. Although I do remember having a conversation with the main character from the second Consequences book and he turned and said to me “shut up, you’ve just shot me”. I said “what?” but nothing more was forecoming. I did eventually shoot him, too. But I was nice about it. I promise.
J A Duxbury's World 