The first appearance of the concept of the “zombi” was in 1916′s The Magic Island by W.B. Seabrook.

In the Vault published by HP Lovecraft in 1925 has the first appearance of a character being bitten by a zombie. It was rejected by Weird Tales for being too “gruesome”.

White Zombie, starring Bella Lugosi and directed by Victor Halperin is credited as being the first zombie film. It’s based on the same voodoo cult style zombies that appeared in Seabrook’s novel.

Things to Come by H.G. Wells was made into a movie in 1936. It was the first appearance of the zombie plague, seen later in books like Jonathan Maberry’s Dead of Night and the Resident Evil movie and videogame series.

Night of the Living Dead, written/directed by George Romero is often credited as the creation of the modern zombie.

Thriller, Michael Jackson’s 1983 music video, is one of the most famous depictions of zombies. Seriously. Everyone knows Thriller.

Zombies Ate my Neighbors is the first zombie video-game I ever played.

Happy Halloween!

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So, it’s Halloween. I’m actually kind of excited that I ended up with the Halloween post because it’s right up my alley. And I was looking forward to the leaves changing and the crisp chill in the air as laughter and screams fill the otherwise silent night.

But I’ve got a more important topic to talk about. Specifically, college football.

Actually no. We’ll stick with blood, guts, and gore.

I’m not going to lie, I love horror. But not the crap that’s filling our cineplexes nowadays. My favorite kind of horror doesn’t jump out and say BOO! It’s the sneaking, creeping blackness that twists your insides and makes you feel the fear.

My favorite horror movie of all time isn’t a slasher. It’s a little independent film called Session 9. Check it out, it has that redheaded guy from CSI.

The movie starts with a simple premise: A waste removal team goes into an abandoned mental asylum to clean the asbestos out of the building to render it safe for some government office or something. There’s nothing that jumps out at the characters, there’s no creepy little girl ready to eat your face. No, it’s a pure psychotic meltdown in the best kind of horror. As the team works diligently to meet their deadlines and put supper on their family’s tables, they uncover some of the patient’s files. And what happens after is the best education in true horror.

Are monsters scary? Sure. I still sleep with the covers over my head every night because I’m afraid Freddy’s coming to get me in my dreams. Don’t blame me, blame the babysitter. Who lets a 9 year old watch Nightmare on Elm Street anyway!?

What do Session 9 and Nightmare on Elm Street have in common? And what are they doing on a writing blog?

In Session 9, we have a prime example of horror, the CHARACTER.

In Nightmare on Elm Street, we have a prime example of horror, the ACTOR.

But wait, don’t actors play characters? Yeah. Sorta. Anything more would be an elementary lesson in literature. And I don’t have the patience to teach.

Freddy Krueger terrorizes children in their dreams, slitting their throats, chasing them around, throwing them in furnaces…It’s gratuitous. Do I have a problem with it? Absolutely not. I’m human. Heck, our whole race’s history is mostly based on sex and violence.

Here, the horror of the story isn’t the character of the fear, it’s the actor of the horror. If that makes sense, then you’ve been eating just as much candy as me.

The Elm Street movies rely on the slash/bang shock and awe of what sort of violence is going to befall the next victim. Movies and books like this are a dime a dozen.

In Session 9, we have the creeping characterization of pure horror as the cleaning crew learns what sort of pseudo-science went on behind closed doors. The influence the asylum has on its new occupants is characterized by the shifting tone as the actors interact and go on their own individual story arcs.

It’s a more satisfying horror that sounds boring on paper. But big on screen.

Which is easier to write? Neither. Which is more satisfying to write? Both.

The issue is everyone that reads your book has a completely different concept of what frightens them. You can’t win every battle. And you can’t save everyone. As long as you don’t trip over the corpse sticking out from under your bed though, you just might be okay.

Providing it doesn’t get you first.

Happy Halloween!

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Very recently, I took part in a workshop with twenty or so other aspiring novelists in the SF and Fantasy genres, and one of the most common problems I ran across was in writing action scenes. Often the scenes came out jumbled and confusing, or the writer simply skipped it. Writing action can be intimidating. It was for me. My first action scene, I confess, was first written by a friend of mine. He did the draft, and I had to fiddle with it until I figured out how it worked.

For me, action scenes have myriad issues that make it difficult to navigate. Here I’m going to focus on one of those issues – the difficult balancing act of how much detail to include. Too much description is much the same as too little; both will leave the reader confused.

The lack of description, I think, is at least partially based on the fact that we hear, again and again, how too much description slows the pacing down. In most cases this is correct, most description is unnecessary because the reader can assume certain things.

Example: He parked and went into the building.

I don’t put in the step by step detail about navigating the parking lot or getting out of the car– putting his foot on the break, turning off the ignition, unlatching his seat belt, opening the door, getting out, and closing the door behind him. Most people know how to get out of a car, so the detail is unnecessary.

Let’s look at the same idea put into an action scene. Take this example I saw recently: I lunged. He landed on the ground with a heavy thud, and I got back to my feet.

Now, I don’t know about you, but I have no idea what just happened. What made the other guy fall? When did the narrator end up on the floor and why? The detail is now a true necessity for the reader to experience what they are reading.

That’s the irony. While, in another type of scene, description can be problematic, it’s necessary for action scenes. Quite simply, most people don’t know what it’s like to be in a gun or sword fight, a space battle, a horse charge, or a kung fu brawl. They don’t have the experience to fill in the gaps, and so the writer has to do the heavy lifting.

The problem comes when the writer moves too far in the other direction. As I said above, too much is just as bad as too little. Get too detailed, and the reader might lose the focus of the scene in all the minutia and become confused anyway.

The way out of this is to be specific rather than wordy. Slamming to the ground, for instance, implies something very different from hitting the ground or slipping to the ground. Also, words that mimic what’s going on can help cut down the word count while still keeping the pacing going. Hard consonants can help a reader hear a gun fight in their heads. Short, concise words echo the pace of a fast moving chase.

Another good thing to remember is the use of paragraphing – shorter paragraphs that describe only one character’s actions can keep what’s going on clear to the reader. Get too long, or put more than one character’s actions in a paragraph, and things start getting muddled again.

So, while finding the right balance can be difficult, it’s by no means impossible. There are plenty of ways to counteract the need for the additional description an action scene requires. The key is to keep the action simple and clear.

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I am guessing this has happened to many of you:

I began work on a novel about two years ago.  The process began with the spark of an idea, nurturing it through plenty of world-building into the semblance of a flame.  After a couple months of kicking this idea around in my head, November was coming around, and with it NaNoWriMo.  I decided to go to town on this new idea, working with some pretty robust world building and a very loose outline, and managed to hit the 50,000 words, but was only about halfway through the story as I envisioned it in my head.

After November, work on the novel inevitably slowed, and that passionate month of writing began to resemble the opening act of a romantic relationship; I was enamored with the idea in November, it was lovely and infallible.  Afterwards, glaring imperfections began to surface and the idea wasn’t so flawless anymore.  It needed work.  I put it on the back burner to simmer.  There were aspects I needed to reconsider.

I worked on it off and on the following year, considering new ideas and beginning new projects all the while, but I always seemed to come back to the original; indeed, I never stopped developing the world, or my ideas on how the outline should play out.

I will tell you a bit about it so I can make a point later.  I will try to be pretty general rather than get locked down in specific details.  The setting was a jungle type environment, something I had never seen before as the prime location in a fantasy story, and one that I was really excited to work with.  Within the jungle lived a single tribe with a terrifying history.  Some time ago, perhaps hundreds of years, the world was locked in eternal war, human blood spilled constantly and endlessly.  The earth was forced to drink this blood, and with enough of it, a terrible evil quickened beneath the crust, giving rise to a malicious jungle.  Most of the population was wiped out as the vegetation sprung up overnight, choking with vines, stabbing with roots, cutting with razor sharp leaves, what have you; quickened through decades of violence, this villainous jungle craved human blood to fuel its growth.

Humans fled as the jungle took root, and the few survivors were able to convene and establish a horribly burned and scarred track of land where nothing whatsoever would grow.  And so they were safe from the onslaught of the jungle, and in time, were able to form a community and begin to slowly grow the human population.

Those are about all the details necessary.  The point is, I worked with this idea for some time, beginning work on the actual novel with interruptions here and there for more world building about what the society was like, how their struggle for survival would play out.

But I began to feel limited.  I was working with a relatively small population, in a relatively cramped and concentrated pocket of the world.  The society itself was nowhere near as complex or established enough for me to tie it allegorically to problems in modern society, which I very badly wanted to do.  What was once a spark, then a fire, eventually dulled and burned out; development ceased and I was unable to overcome these glaring problems with the established world-building.

Recently, a few weeks ago, that unmistakable spark hit me again, and I began to solve my problems.  I had new, vaster ideas; ideas that took all the work I had done into its fold and established something larger.  Suddenly, the old idea was but a facet of the new.  The world, and the story, grew in scope and complexity and have become much more relatable, much easier to work with.

I have heard it say that many works of art – poems, paintings, songs, and novels – are never truly finished.  The artist eventually has to pick a point and sort of walk away, presenting it to the world in its current state.  This makes more sense to me now than it ever has before.  How many of you have experienced the same: an idea that never stops growing, that always becomes richer and more refined.  An idea that will grow over several days, then months, and eventually years.

It is clear to me that an idea for a world and a story is never ‘finished’ and ready to write.  It is true, at some point we will be forced to take what we have and run with it or else it will never see life, but I am sure many of us could sit and incubate a single idea for the entirety of our lives – I can only wonder how imaginative and complex these could grow.

As for me, I am more excited than ever for November to roll around, to give my newly reborn idea another shot at NaNoWriMo and see if it is finally ready to take its first steps into life.

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Through most of last year, I kept a spreadsheet of my writing progress (yeah, I know – you’re surprised, right?). I tracked the dates I wrote and my word count and I’ve discovered some interesting facts about myself.

I have a full time day job and work the usual Monday to Friday with weekends off.  My spreadsheets shows:

* I tend to write for four days in a row and then take a day or two off.

* Sunday is always my most productive day.

* Surprisingly, Monday is my most productive evening. (Who ever expects productivity on a Monday?)

* Tuesdays and Fridays are my least productive days.

* On work days, I am more productive if I get up early (5am) to write, rather than trying to write in the evening.

Now that I’m more aware of these habits, I have been taking note of how I feel – mentally and physically – on different days. And, unsurprisingly, my energy levels correlate with my writing habits:

* Mondays I feel fresh and enthusiastic.

* By Tuesday, I am somewhat tired and less enthusiastic. The weekend is a fading memory and Friday’s not yet in sight.

* On Wednesday, energy and optimism is on the rise again.

* By Friday, I am tired and looking forward to the weekend.

* Saturday is often filled with running errands, catching up on neglected housework, and doing all the things I had intended to do during the week.

* Sunday is my last chance to get in some quality writing time before the work week starts again. I push myself to finish the writing I had intended for that week before it’s time to set goals for the next week.

So now that I’m aware of this, how can I make best use of my time? In looking at my writing habits through last year, there is no point pushing myself to write on a Tuesday. I rarely achieve more than 150 words per hour on Tuesday so let’s leave that as an evening to refresh. Clearly, Monday, Wednesday, Thursday and Sunday are my best options for writing productivity so I should ensure my schedule includes some solid writing time on those days. I should schedule all the other things that need to happen during the week, like housework, walking the dogs and going to the gym, on my non-writing days, thus maximising both my writing time and my energy levels. And obviously I should make more effort to be out of bed at 5am on a work day. Now that the nights are warmer and the sun is rising earlier, this should be easier than it was a few weeks ago.

Take a look at your own writing habits. What do you notice? Is there a particular day or time when you are at your most productive?

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Why do you keep writing, month after month? Why do you persist at honing your craft when encouragement is little or non-existent? What is your dream?

Me, I want it all. I want the New York Times bestseller (even though I know the NYT generally ignores genre writers and so doesn’t actually reflect the highest-selling books). I want to walk into a bookstore or a library and see my precious manuscript on a shelf, printed and bound and shiny. I want to be able to write full time. But more than all of that, I want to share my stories with the world.

Trying to break into the publishing world is a long slog, isn’t it? I have friends who are self-publishing. I don’t intend this post to be about the benefits or otherwise or self-publishing, so I’ll just say that it’s not for me. The publishing world is changing at a rapid pace. Some predictions are dire. E-books are apparently on the verge of taking over the world. Bookstores are closing. Some people say we will barely recognise the publishing industry in a few years. And yet still we push on.

So why do we do it to ourselves? Is it arrogance? A belief that although the world doesn’t yet recognise our genius, it will in time? Is it stubbornness? An unwillingness to let go of the dream just because it seems so far out of reach? I’ve been thinking about this over the last few months and the only answer I can come up with is from my “want” list: I want to share my stories. I don’t have a crystal ball so I don’t know whether perhaps the day might come when the dream dies and I pack away my thesaurus, dictionary, index cards and assorted coloured pens and highlighters.  Perhaps that will happen but maybe – just maybe – I will persist until I actually break through.

In the meantime, I wanted to share with you two quotes I have pinned on the wall in front of my writing space. One is from Stephen King’s ON WRITING and likely most aspiring writers will recognise it:

It’s about the pumpkin.

Don’t know what it means? Get a copy of ON WRITING and read it. Seriously, if you intend to make a career out of writing, you should be familiar with this book. Buy or borrow it, read it, and take note of the story about the farmer and his pumpkins.

The second one is on a cardboard star. I have no idea where it came from. It’s about two inches big and is green and silver.  It says:

 Dream Big

That says it all, doesn’t it? This is what the aspiring writer does. Perhaps your dream is different to mine. Perhaps not. That doesn’t matter. What matters is that we all have the same goal: we are all dreaming big.

What do you keep in your writing space to inspire you?

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Of late, I’ve had a somewhat difficult time committing words to paper (okay, fine, words to screen). There are many reasons for this. Insufficient world-building, insufficient characterization, laziness… trust me, there’s a lot of blame to go around.

When it comes to finding time to sit down and write, if I have something to write about, this is fairly easy to accomplish. Whilst in the middle of a novel, I have no trouble getting my butt in the chair, since I’ve achieved momentum. Writing a thousand words a day for four or five months? Easy. Doable. If anything, the long haul is where I excel.

But what about before I start a novel? For me, world-building cannot be done sitting in a chair. World-building happens almost by accident, when I’m out doing things, having conversations, watching television, readings the news, etc. The spark of an idea comes quickly, but then it takes a while for the world and characters to form around it. These worlds have to percolate for months—dare I say, years—before novel-writing can begin.

It would be easy to label it a discipline problem, but I don’t think that’s it.

I can try to force myself to write before the pieces are in place, but I never get very far. I started writing my current novel back in the spring, then again in summer, and then again last week. Lots of false starts. I say, “I just can’t get going.” And people rightfully reply, “It’s because you don’t know your world/characters well enough.”

Fair enough. But just like in the real world, where it takes months and years to get to know my fellow human beings, it can take a long and unpredictable period of time for all the right world- and character-building pieces to fall into place. And, despite how I’ve described it, this isn’t a passive process. It’s active, requiring constant thought, rumination, deliberation… cogitation…

It’s possible that I’m just slow, that other people get through this conceptual period a lot more quickly than I do. Maybe this is just a symptom of not being a “discovery” writer. I’m bursting with premises, but slow conceptualization is the bottleneck that keeps me from becoming prolific.

I so badly want to be prolific.

Anyone else in the same boat, or is it just me?

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A great plot and fantastic world building mean nothing without solid characters. Solid characters? Aren’t protagonists supposed to have weaknesses, flaws, desires which make them easier to relate to? And aren’t antagonists supposed to have soft spots to make them less stereotypical? True enough. But how do we determine those qualities?

Solid, well rounded characters, above all else, need value systems. What is the character’s core philosophy? What does he/she value above all else? What is most important? Family? Survival? Pursuit of knowledge? Loyalty? Money? Control? Love? Revenge? Adherence to rules? Fully realized characters have values which are challenged as they try to achieve their goals or live up to them. For example, an heiress, loyal to her father and his values which made him wealthy, searches for love and finds it in someone who hates everything her family stands for.

Value systems create opportunity for conflict and give characters depth. Once we’ve discovered those values, the plot comes alive as characters struggle to be true to themselves. For example, in The Hunger Games, despite all contestants valuing survival, they each value other things which motivate them: Katniss wants to save her sister and to avoid loving people but finds herself falling in love with Peeta who she’ll have to kill to win the competition; and Peeta wants to save Katniss but to do so, he must overcome his pacifist nature and kill others.

Ask – What three things does your character value the most?
The most important thing for X is: survival ….. adhering to the rules ….. scientific discovery …. family ….. avoiding love … finding love …. and so on.

We can use Maslow’s Hierarchy to explore the range of values to determine which ones will create the most conflict for our character and our story. Maslow’s Hierarchy orders our human needs from the most basic to self-actualization. Remember, fulfilling our needs determines what our values are at any given point in our lives. That means we can be on level 1 while trying to achieve level 5 because conflicts are never tidy packages – they are individual to the person and even to the culture.

Maslow’s Hierarchy
Level 1 – Survival: basics such as food, shelter, water, clothing, health – what the human body requires to function
Level 2 – Safety and security: personal (violence, natural disaster), financial, health and well being
Level 3 – Love/belonging: friendship, intimacy, family, this is our tribal nature of needing to belong in a group to enhance safety and survival needs
Level 4 – Esteem: being respected by others, needing status, recognition, fame, prestige, and attention. self-respect, mastery, independence and freedom. Respect = greater power
Level 5 – Self-actualization: concerns personal growth and fulfilment

Now use Maslow’s Hierarchy to understand your character’s values and to create conflict. Let’s start with Cindy. She’s a mom, a scientist and a peace activist.

Ask – What three things are most important for Cindy? What does she value? How does that fit into the hierarchy?1) winning the Pulitzer prize for peace by creating a Virtual web around the earth which neutralizes weapons (levels 4 and 5);
2) survival because nuclear proliferation threatens world safety (levels 1 and 2); and
3) her family (level 3).

Create your plot line by threatening all or some of the values or pitting them against one another:
Terrorists steal Cindy’s invention to use it to control all political powers on earth. Cindy must cooperate by agreeing to be their spokesperson and by activating the device in order to save her family. Will Cindy sacrifice her family to save the world? Will she die saving the world but be dishonoured as a traitor?

The higher levels of Maslow’s Hierarchy can be compromised by the lower basic needs or vice versa. Take a value and either go higher or lower on the chart to find a situation or value which can undo it. Ask what your character wants to gain and then ask how that can be undone or threatened by another value or what the effect of that will be.

Once you’ve determined your character’s values, putting them in emotional or physical conflicts which challenge those values makes for interesting reading. How your character responds to those situations creates wonderful opportunities for more action and reaction and moves the story along.

And, as an added bonus, focussing on values helps create the elusive pitch! Here are two quick pitches developed using Maslow’s Hierarchy and a character’s values.

Tom cannot remain the invisible technician aboard a space ship (level 4) when a computer virus compromises life support (levels 1 and 2) and he must overcome his insecurities (levels 4 and 5) to find the traitor before everyone dies.

Kim values family above all else (level 3) but his desire for wealth (level 2) puts him in a compromised position which threatens to bankrupt him and leave his family penniless (levels 1 and 2).

Using these examples create a story by exploring the protagonist’s values. Ask yourself: What is important to the character? What threatens his values? Now, create the supporting characters and determine what is important to each of them. Which of their values will conflict with the protagonist? What internal conflicts arise for each character?

By answering these questions, your plot comes alive through conflict, your characters rise beyond cardboard cut-outs and your readers, well, they’ll love you for it!

So, value your character by developing personal values which are threatened or clash with one another. Let those values drive the plot and watch your story come alive.

Happy writing!

Research sources:
psychology.about.com/od/theoriesofpersonality/…/hierarchyneeds.ht
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow’s_hierarchy_of_needs
www.businessballs.com › leadership/management

http://changingminds.org/explanations/needs/maslow.htm

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Every year, Virginia lawyers have to complete a certain number of class credits (CLEs) to remain certified as a lawyer. A certain number of those hours have to be in ethics. Yes, I know, insert applicable lawyer joke here. Regardless, I still attend ethics classes every year. So, I took a course in The Ethics of Legal Writing. I know—the jokes keep coming.

Most of what I write as a lawyer is derivative. I quote from cases, statutes and articles. The standards that govern my cases are often so ingrained that it’s tempting to repeat them without citation. Junior lawyers (associates) draft pleadings signed by senior lawyers. All these things are plagiarism if proper credit isn’t given to the initial author. One would think I wouldn’t need a class to tell me this. Anyway, the class, an opening written by someone who’d commented on one of my stories and using the same set-up I had (prompting a “déjà vu” comment from one of the critters), and a “Daily Kick” from Dave Farland (Davefarland.net) sent out on September 10, 2011 started me thinking about plagiarism.

A judge once used a paragraph I wrote in his final decision. His opinion didn’t reference that the section came from my brief. Is that plagiarism? Yes. It’s using another’s words without giving that person credit. But, while I’d see red over someone reproducing my fiction writing that way, I took the judge’s use of my paragraph as a huge compliment. I never even considered that the judge was guilty of plagiarism. On the contrary, I’ve pointed to that section of the published opinion with pride.
Senior lawyers have associates who write briefs (the legal documents we file with the Court). The senior lawyer then may file the completed brief without reference to the poor associate who slaved over the document. In the legal profession, as long as the partner reviewed and retained oversight over the work, his taking credit for the associate’s words is acceptable. Yet, in the non-legal writing world, this purest form of plagiarism—stealing someone’s words-destroys careers.

So, is it that lawyers don’t believe in plagiarism when it comes to legal writing? No, we just have different pressure points. The legal writing world is a bit schizophrenic about ghost writing. Ghost writing is when someone writes for a fee knowing that someone else will be listed as the author. In non-legal writing, ghosting is a time honored tradition. Writers are hired to make famous people’s good stories readable. The writer doesn’t get credit for the work, the famous person does. It’s an accepted form of plagiarism since the writer is fairly compensated for the use of his words. Even within the legal writing context, we accept certain types of ghost writing like the associate/senior lawyer example above.

But I can lose my law license if I ghost writing a pleading for an individual who then files the document on a pro se (i.e. without counsel) basis. A pro se party is likely to get more leeway from the Court than an attorney. So Cheatum hires Attorney Dewey to draft a law suit for him. Dewey then allows Cheatum to file it without Dewey’s role being disclosed. Because Cheatum is “pro se”, the Court will likely forgive some of “his” mistakes even if it would have raked Dewey over the coals for those errors. The Virginia Bar considers this form of ghost writing fraud on the Court and the opposing party.

Maybe there’s a reason lawyers need classes on plagiarism. We often don’t think of ourselves as “writers” even though a large portion of what we do, our craft, is written. Plagiarism is center stage in the information age. It’s not just college students trying to fill space in a paper who are plagiarizing these days. Dave Farland’s September 10, 2011 Daily Kick warns of writing scams offering to review or edit your manuscript in order to steal it. The availability of e-publishing allows “writers” to sell their books to readers before those books have been professionally vetted. Most of the time, that’s a good thing. But plagiarism can flourish in this unrestricted marketplace. Non-lawyer writers don’t sit through CLEs. All writers, legal and non-legal, need to be vigilant about the many forms of plagiarism given current technology. As David Farland suggests and the Bar Association requires, be careful with electronic documents. Don’t send them to people you don’t know.

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No, it’s not a new Yoga position. I’m talking about how we balance our time when our butt is in the writing chair. Most writers have to manage their time to write between jobs, family, and friends. There are dozens of blog posts about finding the time to write. But I’m talking about how we spend our time when we have our butt in chair, fingers on keyboard.

I used to take care of my emails first. Even after I delete the advertisements, sappy forwards from well-meaning friends and family, and other unnecessary emails, by the time I read my Daily Kick, Magical Words, and Duotrope update then take care of necessary emails, I’ve usually eaten up nearly an hour. Then there are critiques I’ve promised for fellow writers, submission updates for short stories, agent research, books on writing to read, books by other authors in my field to read, and you know…the list goes on.

So, in all of this, how do we become the writers we want and hope to be? The obvious answer to this; we need to write. Though it may sound selfish, we have to put our own work first.

I once read a parenting book that said you can’t do anything for your children unless you take care of yourself. The idea was that you’ll be a better parent if you take the time to exercise regularly, read, and spend time on goals that are important to you. Take a little time for yourself so what you give your family is of higher quality.

I think the same holds true in writing. I’m a better reviewer if I take the time to write. It’s not going help my writing goals to read books, fiction or otherwise, if I don’t take the time to write. My editing isn’t going to be worth crap unless I take the time to write.  In short, no matter what else I have to do or get done, I make sure the majority of my time is spent actually writing. And I do my story writing during my optimum, creative thinking time. Sorry, everyone else gets the leftovers.

I write while my kids are at school in the morning and, depending on how tired I am, I use the evening. In the afternoon, when my brain wants to go to sleep, I answer e-mails, send submissions, critique colleagues’ work, do blog posts (yes, it’s the afternoon at this moment), handle agent research, compile my other research, etc. I use spare moments to read: as the computer boots up, during breakfast, in between matches at my daughter’s badminton game, and so on. I can do all of these things without full focus and do them well, but I want the best part of my day, the most creative part, devoted to the reason I’m doing all the other stuff…to make my writing the best it can be.

The important part is to use the time you have to your best advantage. Balance.

I know most people are dealing with work schedules, perhaps schooling, and/or they have small children at home. What works for you and why?

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This is a topic I’ve been thinking about lately, and is similar to the recent post from Kylie on Unleashing the Muse

Although the topics are similar, I’m taking a slightly different approach so hopefully it won’t seem like overkill.

I recently watched the movie “Stranger Than Fiction” with Will Ferrell and Emma Thompson.  If you haven’t seen it, I highly recommend it.  Very funny.  Emma Thompson is a novelist who kills her heroes, and somehow Will Ferrell becomes her next character and can hear her voice as she types and prepares to kill him.  Fascinating concept, moreso for the fact that Emma Thompson can’t quite figure out the right way to kill off Will Ferrell.  She gives a brilliant portrayal of a less-than-stable author suffering from writer’s block.  She goes to some amazing extremes in her attempt to get the right idea.

The following clip shows just how far she’ll go:  to an emergency room to view injured and dying patients to get real-life inspiration.

Stranger Than Fiction clip – Writers Block

As the clip so wonderfully portrays, some writers struggle mightily with writer’s block.

Do you?

What do you do about it?

I don’t suffer from writer’s block very often.  I spend lots of time in the early stages of story creation planning, considering different ideas, and fleshing out exactly what I want to achieve with the scenes, the characters.  Once that basic framework is nailed down, the actual writing of the story is pretty straight-forward.  The big exception is if a new, unexpected idea hits me while I’m writing a scene.

So am I just lucky?  Inspired?  Or do I not push the envelope far enough?

I believe that many times writer’s block is a symptom of one of these deeper problems:

• Lack of clarity of a story’s mission or concept
• Lack of understanding of the correct plot framework the story needs to build upon
• Incomplete worldbuilding
• Weak or inconsistent conflict
• Trying to force a story down a direction that just doesn’t work, which the author may understand at an instinctive level, but lacks enough mastery of the craft to consciously identify the shortcoming and therefore begin the process of correction.

When have you run into writer’s block?  Is it at a particular phase in a story every time, or does it happen at random intervals?  How do you find ways around it?

As mentioned in Kylie’s previous post, one approach that often helps is the BIC_HOK (Butt In Chair, Hands On Keyboard) approach:  force yourself to work, to type, to drive yourself into ‘the zone’.   This actually works for me.  Sometimes playing the right music as I try to get into ‘the zone’ helps a lot.

Another way to help explore options is playing the “What If?” game.   Back up to the last part that worked in the story before you hit the snag that’s holding you up and start asking “What if?”.  Search for the most surprising, craziest possible twists you could add.  Or look at the scene and consider if anything similar has ever been done before, and then ask “What If?” you took the opposite track?

The worst thing you can do is just give up and say “I’ll write tomorrow.  Maybe I’ll feel like it then.”  ;or blame it on a Muse that just isn’t talking today.

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…for the most part.  A little over a month ago I wrote about how I was avoiding writing.  Actively not doing my job.  And, though I failed that week in overcoming my issues.  I have since made progress.  Kylie asked for an update.  Here it is.

 At some point, a few weeks ago, I made a resolution (like for New Year’s – except I’m keeping this one) that I would wake up and write.  I would not check the insidious email distraction until I wrote for several hours first. 

 If I check the email first, then I get side-tracked by reading blogs, leaving comments in hopes of winning some prize for doing so, deleting the hundred emails I don’t have time for, answering questions, and doing tasks requested in emails.  Seriously, that can take me until noon if I’m not careful.  Then I try to write but my brain is fried from the afore-mentioned distractions, so I need a nap, and then I’m fuzzy headed and not feeling creative.  Another day gone and wasted and no writing to show for it.  Grrrr.

 But with my new resolution, if I don’t look at the email, don’t even open it until after I write, even if I don’t get back to the writing in the afternoon, I’ve accomplished my main goal of getting words on page.  HA!  Evil email and internet tool that I love, I have conquered you and I wrote despite your tempting ways. 

 Maintaining my resolution, I am working my way through my story.  Some days are more productive than others, but whether I get 600 words or 6000, I am getting closer to ‘The End’. 

How is everyone else doing?

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Do you have a muse?  Does your muse have a solid form: arms, legs, hair, clothes?  Or it is an ethereal creature, more of a spirit moving quietly within your mind?  Writers throughout time have held close this image of a muse and many have fervently believed their muse to be the wellspring of their ideas.  The ancient Greeks believed in nine muses, the daughters of Zeus, who inspired writers, poets, artists and musicians.  Perhaps the idea of a muse is to ease the pressure on ourselves.  When the words won’t come, it’s not our fault – it’s because the muse has temporarily abandoned us.

 My ideas originate from deep inside of me, swirling up out of a jumble of every sight, sound, taste, smell and thought I’ve ever had, from every image I’ve seen, every conversation I’ve overheard, every book I’ve read, every movie I’ve watched.  Somehow, out of all of this confusion of experiences, comes an idea.  Perhaps a single image or character, sometimes a place or time that begs me to explore.  And gradually, as that idea lingers in my mind, it somehow weaves itself into a story, with other characters, a landscape, a mythology, a purpose.  And that’s the magic of being a writer, isn’t it?  Taking that single image or idea and turning it into something that’s beautiful or horrifying or wonderful, or maybe all three at once.

 But what do you do when the muse refuses to talk?  When you sit down at the computer, put your fingers to the keyboard, and the words won’t come?  Some writers use a variety of exercises to get the creativity flowing: free writing, character backgrounds, writing a scene using nothing but dialogue.  Some leave that project to work on another for a time, maybe a short story.  Others subscribe to the good old theory of BICHOK: Butt In Chair, Hands On Keyboard.

I waiver between trying hard to adhere to the butt in chair philosophy and merely waiting: waiting for inspiration to return.  The latter is never efficient and rarely effective, yet we writers are somehow able to justify to ourselves time spent doing absolutely nothing while waiting for the muse to return.  What other profession could do this?

 So how do you intend to cope when the muse next abandons you?  Make a plan and you’re that much closer to surviving the absence of the fickle force we call creativity.  What will it be: butt in chair, creativity exercises, reading quotes of inspiration?  Share your plan and perhaps you’ll spread a little inspiration amongst us all.

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