When I was a teenager and decided I wanted to be a writer, I went to the library and checked out every book I could find about writing. They were all written by plotters. I contorted myself trying to follow their systems because only plotters were True Writers according to every one of these books. Only I was more of a seat-of-the-pants writer and plotting made me hate writing. Hate so much I almost decided to give it up.
Until the day I realized I missed writing and I was going to keep writing, but I'd do it my way and if I never became a real writer, that was just how it would be.
It's been my experience that so many plotters still maintain the plotting is the only true way to write. Hey, I would seriously like to be more of a plotter because it would make my life so much easier, but I'm not. I'm not a pure pantser either for that matter, but hey, it's my process.
But back to the Chernobyl podcast. Craig not only talks about the story, he talks about the choices he made in telling the story. OMG, I love this! And because this is a real event, he talks about what he changed for the sake of story and what is 100% true. (Hint: Most of it!) My only regret is that the podcast only goes as long as the series because I'd love to hear more about how he made his story choices.
Also, as an FYI, Craig Mazin is half the team (with John August) that does the Script Notes podcast which I am totally hooked on. The tag line is something like: Screen writing and things that are interesting to screen writers. They talk a lot about craft. Some of it is helpful for novels, some of it is so tied to how to write a script that it doesn't translate well. I still enjoy listening to it, and when I hear about what happens to a script, I am hugely glad I write novels. :-)
