When I began writing stories in the 80s, I was a classic pantser – I didn’t realise it at the time because I was barely eight years old, and to waffle on for pages and pages about the fairy at the bottom of the garden seemed appropriate. My mum would ooh and aah in all the right places, and my teacher would add a smiley face at the bottom of my page. Little did I know that they were lulling me into a false sense of security. The revelation of being either a pantser or plotter would only become known to me once I hit forty. I wrote blindly, hoping to get to the brutal end of my story with a suitable middle and a punchy beginning, but it never panned out. I would inevitably run out of steam, or my characters would become bored with their adventure. It was in 2013 when I was finally introduced to the joys of plotting. Eager to take part in my first NaNoWriMo contest (National Novel Writing Month – a contest to pen a 50,000 word novel in 30 days), I engaged in the forum discussions