I just finished a scene, where one of my characters created a demon/monster sidekick.
One that does not talk and they are completely alone in the desert.
This was not in my outline.
Having an outline, (for me) basically means I have the whole book written down in chapters, with a brief explanation of what is supposed to happen. This is a separate document, and in my case, it’s around 15 000 words.
When I began to write, I just wrote without thinking anything ahead. That did not work for me. I got lost.
Since I began outlining, the writing got much easier and felt more focused. I know where I’m going with each scene, and what will follow. Sometimes I make changes, of course, as nothing is written in stone. I realize I need an additional scene here, or I need to remove that scene there, and so on.
The demon/monster sidekick? I did not see that one coming at all. Of course, the character in question has always had the tools to do such a thing, but he had never done it before (not in his backstory and not so far in the novel), and he was never supposed to either.
But in his defense: it was an accident.
Trying to write dialogue or any kind of interaction with a thing that does not speak, is not easy, I noticed. I have to rely on head movement and body language as only means to display emotions. That’s all I have to work with. I don’t want the demon/monster to speak, cause, come on, that would be weird.
Now I have to return my character and his pet-demon. Do they have other plans I don’t know about? Only one way to find out.