Ok I'm sure i'm not the only one to ever have to deal with this, but when your writing do you ever get to a part that your not sure what to write, like its a 'run thru part' but you have to write it to get to a part where you really want to write and are ready for? Does this make any sense? lol
One sec, i have a thread of my own with some good feedback, you'll just have to tailor it to you. Let me find it EDIT: https://www.writingforums.org/showthread.php?t=14098 The OP explains it, but my main focus was figuring out how to get from A to C with a brief lay over at B.
I have this issue frequently. Some people advocate just skipping the difficult part and writing what comes next, then returning to mend it up later, though I'm not somebody who can write like that (everything will end up out of continuity if I do). Those particular parts are difficult and dreary but all I can do personally is make myself slog through them and hope that they don't read as difficult as they were to write! Then I can reward myself with writing the fun part. Sort of like eating one's veggies before you can progress to the dessert.
I can't skip either. I will, however, highlight an area in red when I know I forced myself through writing it. Once I'm done with the entire story/novel/what have you, I go back and give in a nice once-over. Usually, I end up rewriting it... but, I still can't skip it on my first run through. Like tehuti said, it feels a lot like eating dessert first to me - just wrong somehow. Now, when it comes to rewrites, I'll start in the middle and work my way in both directions. I know my story backwards, forwards, and inside out by then, so it doesn't really mess with my perception of what's going on.
I would ask myself how necessary the part is. Remember, you don't have to walk your characters every single inch of the way from point A to point B.
I just finished reading a novel by Louis L'Amour in which a boy is abandoned and grows up under the care of a traveling gambler. The story uses a series of sub-plots, each highlighting some significant event in the boy's development. These mini-stories jump forward a large numbers of years between each one as the boy becomes a man. Certain characters and global issues carry through all the sub-plots and come together at the end in a crescendo of climax. The thing I found interesting about the author's treatment of the time between events was that he virtually ignored "smooth transition" from one time frame to the next. The first jump in time caught me by surprise and was a bit annoying, but once I acclimated to his writing style in this book, I actually enjoyed the fast pace that was created by such treatment. Maybe authors do not need to hand feed readers every little detail???
Thank you so much everyone for your thoughts. I finally did write it but I took one of your suggestions and highlighted it in red so I can go back over it later and possibly rewrite it =) Thank you!
I agree. I am so thankful when the author of a book I'm reading doesn't force you to walk along the sidewalk, open the trunk, get the bags out, check for tickets and id, then through the ticket processing, the baggage drop off, security, then the waiting area, down the hallway and onto the plane...just so the character can travel abroad, lol. Unless of course it serves a purpose or offers a clue...
Hogwash, nothing is better then reading over I need to know how many paces he took and how many times he scrubbed each tooth. Just Kidding!
