Writing tips

The road to publication: hitting ‘the wall’

| linleysarah1

After a month away from book three to concentrate on editing book two, I returned to it at the start of November raring to go!

I considered using NaNoWriMo to catch up with the time I had missed but decided against it. In case you have never heard of it, NaNoWriMo stands for National Novel Writing Month and is a writing challenge to write 50,000 words in November. The idea behind it is to write quickly, not worrying too much about the quality, and then you have something to edit by the end. 50,000 words is not really long enough to be a novel but it’s a very good start.  

Some of the benefits of NaNoWriMo are the companionship of others taking part in the challenge, word sprints where you aim to reach a certain number of words in a short space of time, and writing prompts on social media. I know a lot of people who use NaNoWriMo successfully, but I have only tried it once and it wasn’t for me.

I like to plod along, adding to my word count slowly and steadily. I decided instead to aim to write 1,000 words a day for three days then have the fourth day for planning and research so completing around 5,000 – 6,000 words a week. This was considerably more than I was writing in October.

At first it went well but then my lack of planning meant I ground to a halt. I literally did not know what happened next in the plot. My characters were in a dilemma but then they were kind of stuck there and nothing was happening. I knew the ending, but I didn’t know how I was going to get them there.

I took a few days off, brainstormed a few ideas, and then carried on writing. I asked myself what was the worst thing that could happen to my characters now, and what was the best thing? What were they hoping for? What did they fear? Nothing was off the table. I told myself it would be OK to include an alien invasion if that’s what needed to happen to move the plot along. I came up with a few scenes. I wrote some more words.

And then nothing. I have never really experienced writer’s block, and I’m not sure this even counts, but I just couldn’t find any enthusiasm to write. My story was stupid, no-one would want to read it, why was I bothering? I had hit ‘the wall’.

I took the weekend off. I gave myself permission to give up writing altogether or start something new if I wanted to. I felt miserable and tired. I rested. And then this morning, at 3am (thanks insomnia!) I woke up fuelled with ideas. The words started flowing again. I have a feeling it’s going to be a rocky road ahead but at least that word count is heading in the right direction.

What do you do to keep going if you hit a wall? Any tips?

Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash

The Road to Publication: Writing a first draft

| linleysarah1

I am currently writing the first draft of Book Three, as yet untitled.

Every writer is different, but I usually take around six to eight months to write my first draft. I aim to write 3,000 words a week for around 30 weeks, but life sometimes gets in the way.

I started writing my first draft on 1 July and so far, I have written 24,000 words so I am about on target to finish by the end of January / early February.

I will then take a break for around six weeks while I do some research before tackling my second draft. It’s usually after the third draft that I feel comfortable showing it to anyone.

You may have heard of ‘pantsers’ and ‘planners’ but I’m neither. I like to have an outline to work to, but I don’t plan my books too much before I start. Otherwise I feel like I have already written it and I quickly lose passion for the story. Likewise, I can’t just start writing with no idea where I’m heading so pantsing doesn’t work for me either.

I like the snowflake method of writing. If you haven’t heard of it, there is a very good ebook available which explains the method. You basically alternate between developing character and plot and work from the very essence of the novel outwards, writing and plotting as you go.

I have also recently read Save the Cat, so I am trying to structure my book according to the 15 story beats. A lot of writers struggle with a ‘flabby middle’ (where nothing really happens in the book), so I think it’s important to have a good midpoint twist. I’m quite excited about mine!

I’ll keep you posted how I get on!

Photo by Green Chameleon on Unsplash