Ahoy and avast, writers! Also beware! We live in perilous times. As I write, we are poised on not one but several literary precipi:
Precipice One: I am guest hosting Write On! because SensibleShoes is setting out for her Avignon Papacy, i.e. relocating for the winter to some backwater with primitive if any internet function. She has promised to drop in and even write the occasional diary, but I for one feel forlorn, like a lamb bereft of Little Bo Peep and/or Mary (the one with the little lamb, I mean). Please note that I have just compared Sensho to characters played by Jeremy Irons and to nursery rhyme shepherdesses. You can see how upset I am.
Precipice Two: Some of our number are poised to embark on a great, albeit precipitous, adventure: Writing a Novel Very Very Fast, starting on Saturday. According to my notes, these include 3rd time participant terrypinder, second-time participant Orinoco, jeremybloom, WiseFerret, and possibly Prinny Squad. Cfk will report progress on her Togwogmagog saga, and not a lamb will report word count on an ongoing dissertation. Is anyone else going to dive in/off?
Precipice Three: Hallowe'en tomorrow. Stephen King. The Haunting. My big brother's improvised ghost stories. Sure, he was carried out of The Wizard of Oz screaming with terror at the winged monkeys when he was four, but trust me, he got his own back and then some. The Hand at The Foot of The Bed. Need I say more?
Precipice Four: In fact, this isn't really a precipice. I wish it were a precipice. Instead it's a vast, featureless desert of hot, hot sand. Far away in every direction are misty, welcoming mountains which may however turn out to be mirages. I speak, of course, of that Black Dog of our vocation, Writer's Blo-- No! I don't even believe in it.
Unfortunately, whether I believe in it or not, I've been stuck off and on for the past week, and it cuts into production.
Sensible Shoes suggests and illustrates bubble mapping and the Game of 20. Bubble mapping, when I can get unstuck enough to execute it, is a gas. The Game of 20 feels like a law school exam and doesn't work. For me. It might work for you.
The internets are less helpful than usual because they lean toward the theoretical at best and the unreal at worst:
They subcategorize the whole problem to death. They psychoanalyze it without a license. They do celebrity interviews about it. And when you're finished reading all that stuff, you've spent a lot of time when you could have been writing, and besides you're now depressed.
My favorite piece of advice came from the hyper-intellectual school -- what Fritz Perls would have called elephantshit (a classier item than bullshit and chickenshit). This can be distilled to: Write a lousy first draft.
What we call writer’s block usually stems from a lack of perspective about the nature of the drafting process....
The first draft requires a show of sinew, not nuance. We write badly because we need our early drafts to show us, in broad strokes, what we’re actually supposed to be writing about. We write badly because we need to focus our energy on the larger story and structure, and can’t possibly attend to all the elements that make up a developed or refined work. We write badly because, even if we revise as we draft – and, mea culpa, many of us do – either we can’t revise with a complete manuscript in mind or we’re too close to that manuscript to have sufficient perspective…
That's Dan Millman and Sierra Prasada in The Creative Compass: Writing Your Way From Inspiration to Publication.
Okay. More perspective and sinew. Lees nuance. Broad strokes. No problem. "So then the bad guy tried to kill the good guy but he wasn't able to and instead he got arrested or killed himself and everyone else lived happily ever after." Done.
The problem arises post-sinew, when the writer has to figure out how the bad guy will try to kill the good guy, in a way that's consistent with the bad guy's character and intelligence, with the story so far, and with reality (as defined in the story). It's all very well to talk about broad strokes, but not terribly useful when the broad strokes take you right off the canvas. Right now putting myself into the bad guy's head and planning the murder attempt while making sure it doesn't succeed and yet is a darn good effort and plays well, is overtaxing my synapses and making them spark and buzz and short out. Maybe I need synapse vitamins.
Another suggestion is to work on something else for a while. So for everyone who's loosening up in the bullpen (a la Madison Bumgarner, hopefully) for NaNoWriMo, and for everyone who's just stuck, here's:
Tonight's Challenge:
Using any of the following scenarios, or one of your own, write a scene in which the protagonist must work with his/her deadly enemy. Try to keep it to 150 words.
*Belinda learns that her rival Adelaide is plotting to marry Belinda’s beloved Lord Postlethwaite-Praxleigh (pronounced Puppy) in order to get her hands on his jeweled sash.
*A callow youth must find the Jewel of Togwogmagog in order to save the kingdom, aided by his Stout Companion.
*Goodwife Thankful Goodheart feeds her hens and minds her own business until that awful Agnes Addlepate starts causing trouble in the village.
*A stranger comes to the Wiltchester Dragon Farm, wanting to buy a baby dragon. Why does ace dragon breeder Jocasta Entwhistle sense trouble?
*Private investigator Celia Spunk's client wants her to find the Chainsmoke Killer. He turns out to be closer than anyone could have imagined.
Happy Hallowe'en Eve! Happy Day o' the Dead and NaNoWriMo Eve Eve!
The Write On! timeslot has changed to Thurs 7 pm ET (4 pm Pacific) for the winter.
Before signing a contract with any agent or publisher, please be sure to check them out on Preditors and Editors, Absolute Write and/or Writer Beware.