How do you keep track of your notes?

[Andy]

When you're writing a book (especially a series), how do you keep track of all the things to keep track of? I keep all my stuff in word files and excel documents, but it's getting overwhelming.

I've got three plots for each book in my trilogy to work out, a timeline of events before the books, stuff about magic, family trees, and it's driving me nuts now, because it's a pain switching from file to file. I think what might work best is a big empty room, so I can put post-it notes all over the walls and easily add and remove stuff, and find what I need. :D

Any suggestions?

[Nyx]

Well what I do is make one word document with hyperlinks to all the other files. I list the files in orde, the ones I use the most on top and the less used ones lower on the list. This works fine for me since I just use that one file to switch around to everything.

[jordanisonfire]

Ok, this is amazing. My mind (yes, my tiny, insignificant mind) has the plots (what I've worked out so far) stored in it. I know, a lot of you will say "Well, I can do exactly the same thing", but this is a big thing for me. I have a terrible memory, so this is the only big thing I can actually keep track of. :D

[Crocolyle]

I personally recommend notebooks and taking your notes by hand, but I'm not sure if that'd really work for you... My notes aren't normally very extensive and I repeat a lot off my information in other notes (like for my novella, there are like 4 outlines that become increasingly more detailed in that notebook). Finding the page with the right notes also takes a little bit of searching, and it's kind of disorganized... but that's what works for me. It might because I write a lot of it by hand in semi-note/semi-paragraph form before I type it up...

[Carraka]

I, um, don't keep track of them. I have the plot, and I have all the different plots that I've dumped, but that's pretty much it. Once I made a character profile for Corin, but I've lost it. I've lost most of everything else, but at least I remember the important stuff in my head.

I keep meaning to be more organized, but I'll scribble something down in math class, and soon it'll be mixed with my history notes and recycled with the latest Biology quiz.

[Steak-Ums]

I don't. My mind is my library, and I feel that if a novella is in me, than my mind will keep up with the best of the best ideas.

[GeorgeMichael]

I don't have anything either, but starting tomorrow I'm doing this whole note thing in my notebook so that might be the start of some organization...

[Rafael Domination]

I have three categories:

Brainstorm Notes, Spur-of-the-moment Notes and Organized notes. The organized notes are separated between plot and world note piles and are stored on notebooks, floppy disks, in my brain and in computer files.

They always change so I have a day of the week where I appoint somenotes more dominant than others, and the old notes I keep at the bottom of the pile, just in case they might give me ideas in the future.

[Andy]

That sounds like what I have. Brainstorming notes, then organized-sheets-of-paper notes, then stuff on the computer, which is even more organized. I've got one computer folder for each book, plus another for ancient notes and stuff I hardly ever look at. :D

[Rafael Domination]

I know! Brainstorming is an excellent way to get your mind stimulated on things! At times, at the end of a good Brainstorm, I can shift through pages of notes and use them at my discretion. It's hard to give characters unique abilities, make up unique plots, and even harder to choreograph half-decent fight scenes.


BTW...I just sucked all of your character's magic out...:D

[Andy]

An even better stimulant is when you've got two things, and can connect them in a significant way. Like, "How about I take this guy...and make him the same guy who escaped from this prison a long time ago?!" or something like that. Really opens up some neat plot situations...

[Rafael Domination]

It's harder for me cuz' I've got written notes and DRAWN notes. I still can't decide whether to put the drawn notes and written notes about, lets say, a person, in the same pile, or keep them separate, cuz' it becomes too much of a bother to search for if I keep them separate, or too disorganized if I keep them together...

[Andy]

Have two manilla folders per character, and keep them next to each other. Combining them...yeah, that sounds like a headache.

[Rafael Domination]

Oooh! Thanks for the tip! :D

[Imelda]

Most things are on the computer for me. I have a few notebooks with ideas jotted down, but that's for when I'm on the move, and I usually copy them up when I get home. Then I put them into whatever will organise them best, so I have timelines as drawn timelines, plots as a word document, plots with two POVs moved into a spreadsheet so I can shuffle them around, then written onto post-its because it's easier :P. I have a database with names, a few spreadsheets of character profiles when I first start them, but mostly they stay in my head and have conversations with each other to develop themselves. It's plots I mostly write down.

And in answer to the question: I don't keep track of them, I have to randomly leaf through till I find it, unless I remember were I put it. :S

[Shaun]

I don't do a lot of plotting or any of that for my work. Generally I can't stand plotting because it ruins the story for me and I get bored. Sometimes I'll do a little plotting, but never a full outline or anything like that.
For general story ideas I use my small moleskine notebook because it's compact, versatile, and easy to carry around.
For brainstorming I will just use a piece of paper or, sometimes, I'll use Freemind (google search for that program). It's a free program that lets you create mind maps, which are great for fleshing out ideas and the like and also for organizing basic information. My entire space opera universe is there, although I sort of stole it for another work, since I really liked the design (The Lies of Venicia happens to be the novel that I am using the constructed universe for).
Evernote is another great free program for keeping notes on things. I have a lot of WISB in there. Mostly I have creatures and characters, just so I can keep track, but I am hoping at some point to turn the whole thing into a giant encyclopedia for the world in the satin bag.
Outlining, if I do any of it, is done in word or on paper.
Yeah, so I think that explains it all.

[Rafael Domination]

I used to have one gigantic pile with everything in it. It didn't work out the way my 13-year-old self thought it would...

[Eve]

I just jot down little mental notes in my notebook. It helps.