It's not obvious.
Outlines are never written in stone. Things change, stories evolve, become something different, something unexpected. That's half the fun right there, the “making up fiction” part. I learned that there needs to be a balance between making it up and keeping things organized. In other words, outline and crafting fiction.
For my latest book, I wrote a total of three outlines. Why? Because I was still learning as I went along. The second is a revised version of the first, once the story began changing, so I wrote it all down, including the possible outcomes based on these new events. In retrospect, I could have given the first outline more thought and put most of this stuff in, but again, stories can change in unexpected ways. I can't predict the future, but I can make pretty good guesses about possibilities from my story idea.
The third outline was something different and just for the sake of keeping everything organized as best as I could. It's not easy juggling a mystery. I wrote the third in point form (the other two are in paragraph form), and color coded all the clues. This clue goes with that clue, etc. It was something I decided to do when I was about 10 chapters into the story. I suddenly realized there was a lot more to juggle than expected (the story had changed, again).
I have no idea if I'll do this again. Like I said, I was still learning and probably won't have to write more than one outline for the next book. At least I hope not. It was a bit anal of me...
Then I kept writing, kept checking my outlines, kept making little tweaks, and overall, went back and forth a lot between the outlines and the manuscript. It worked out well, even better than I'd hoped. Having those outlines on hand helped a great deal to drive me to finish the manuscript.
It wasn't always smooth sailing. There were moments of panic where I had to take a long break, take a step back or just go for a walk. Sometimes I needed to let certain ideas brew and simmer in my mind before I could tackle the next scene/chapter.
The outlines I wrote were my navigator, and my ability to write chose the direction. The combination of both, let me arrive at my intended destination. And what was that? My synopsis.
