.

One of the challenges in this current novel I am writing, created because I am “pantsing” it—writing the entire thing without a preplanned map or outline—is that I know certain things need to be solved, but the manner of that resolution was utterly unknown to me.

For example, the cultists who have set the plot into motion started everything some 52 years before the novel opens in 1984. Their actions, plots, plans, and objectives are buried in that history and drive the major action, both physical and supernatural, of the story. That’s all well and good, but for the protagonist to come out ahead—to defeat their plans—he has to first know and understand them, and he is way out of date.

There never was going to be a Bond or comic book-like scene where one of the bad guys takes the time to explain everything to my protagonist. That’s not this type of story, and it is not my style of writing.

I knew this problem existed, and in previous books I would have solved the trouble at the outline stage, having worked out a method that served the story, the character, and my own sense of plotting—but not when I am pantsing it. I started the manuscript with only the vaguest idea of precisely what was happening and why, much less any conception of how the “good guys” were going to get clued in on it.

Now I have completed Act 4 of 5, and I really, really need to answer that troublesome question.

And the answer came to me yesterday. It arose naturally, organically from events and backstory I had created along the way. There are details to be worked out and much establishing to do in the revision stage, but the shape can be seen, and it had been there for chapters and chapters—but it took me a good long while to see it.