Crafting Your Book's Visual Map--New Ways to Use a Storyboard

Storyboards are a fast and easy template to check the strength of a book's structure.  More and more writers use them.  I hear about famous authors who now "design" their books via a storyboard.  It's a classy idea whose time has come.

Filmmakers will be yawning here.  Storyboards are the basis of most films--they are like cartoon boxes that show the scenes and can be rearranged to create the best flow. 

But book publishers use them too.  Twenty years ago, I hired on every six months to an all-day storyboarding session for a Midwestern small press.  Eight "experts" gathered in their conference room, bolstered by coffee and snacks and catered lunch.  A facilitator drew the empty cartoon boxes of our blank storyboard on one wall, gave us our topic, and off we'd go. 

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