We interrupt writing on the current novel to attempt the stupid. Again.
Script Frenzy is an international writing event in which participants attempt the creatively daring feat of writing an original, full-length screenplay—or stage play—in a single month. Spurred by a wild deadline and buoyed by a community of countless other writers, Script Frenzy participants can’t [...]
Okay, now that NaNoWriMo is over, I find myself with an odd dilemma. Should I keep writing Homeworld exclusively until I finish the first draft, or is it acceptable to start working on other projects, too?
One of the side effects, as it were, of NaNo is that I’ve got a renewed enthusiasm for writing [...]
Ah, there’s the rub, isn’t it? You can write up a storm during NaNoWriMo, but what about the other eleven months of the year? Months when you don’t have this massive support network, months where you don’t have a public and potentially very embarrassing promise to yourself. Can you keep NaNoWriMo in your heart all [...]
Let’s say you’ve done everything right. You’ve bound and gagged your internal editor and locked him in his office, freeing you and your muse to write the worst dreck imaginable. You’ve mapped out and jealously guarded your writing time for each day. You have a buddy to shame you into sticking to it, and you’ve [...]
At some point in your book, you’ll hit a wall and as you’re asking yourself, “and then what?” something else will pop into your mind. Since this scene is so hard, why not go back and work on polishing up that really cool scene a few chapters ago? It’s still working on the book, so [...]
Speaking of Josh, I’ve also learned that writing can be a lot like swimming. It helps to have a buddy.
We hear a lot about how writing is a solitary pursuit, the romantic image of a lone writer slumped over his typewriter. While it’s possible to write that way–I’ve done it–it’s not all that much [...]
By uncomfortable I’m not suggesting that you write on your snow-packed balcony in Bermuda shorts, although a change of scenery can work wonders. I’m talking about getting out of your comfort zone as a writer. When you’re forced to stretch, forced to try something new and gawky and unfamiliar, that’s when the magic happens as [...]
While we’re on the subject of word count, let’s discuss that thorny old excuse, “but I don’t have time to write!” If you want it bad enough, and you have a reasonably challenging deadline—like 2,000 words per weekday—you’ll find a way. But I learned something interesting this month. Having more time doesn’t mean more writing. [...]
They say that no battle plan ever survives contact with the enemy, and this is true of fiction outlines, too. I used to be a diligent planner and plotter. I would meticulously plan out every scene of every chapter. That’s how I wrote most of Between Heaven and Hell, my first novel. And frankly, it [...]
This kind of goes hand and glove with the above tip about forward momentum. It seems counterintuitive, in a way. When I was just starting on The Unification Chronicles about ten years ago, it was a major accomplishment to write my 250 words (one typeset page, on average) before work every day. Writing ten times [...]