The Writers Block Thread

Brandy,

I think most people write the type of stories or novels they'd like to find on a book shelf or magazine rack, or online.

Don't feel intimidated or that your work isn't good enough. One thing to remember is that what your writing (the documents you indicate you start but then close because you view it as crap) is that it is a first draft. Very few writers have a first draft that is anywhere near ready for publication, so I suspect you're one of those writers in the majority.

You have to write a first draft...finish it. Let it sit a while, then go back and revise and edit...probably more than once.

Writing is a process, something you get better at as you do it. You'll learn, your individual voice will come through, and you'll see that your eventual product is not the "crap" you first percieved it to be.

It might benefit you to do some prewriting preparation--plot, outline, research, before you begin the next project.

Hope it all comes together for you!

Terry

 

brandy...
if you want to know whether it's really as bad as you think it is, you can send it to me for a critical read... and some suggestions for how to make it better, if your fears are well founded...

love and hugs, maia
maia3maia@hotmail.com

 

Thanks everyone!

I am going to take it one step at a time. Right now, I am working closely with a friend who will gladly read for me - she is the person who keeps pushing me to write.

I was feeling up to it this morning, so I wrote a few pages. It feels good to write - I just worry that I am coming off as the 'authority' on the topic - and that is NOT what I want.

My one 'dream' in all of this is that people will read what I write and then use the lessons I learned to make their situation better...or not...whatever works for them.

The bottom line - I am told often how 'lucky' I am to have such a wonderful experience - I just want others to be lucky too, so I want to share what I've learned!

But I don't want to come off as a jackass...and...well...I feel like a jackass.

Again, thanks! I'll keep coming back here and updating.

Brandy

 

I was the exact same way. And now when I do read everything I wrote, I do realise that I was so totally right in thinking that I write total crap.
But I kept on writing. Slowly, it helped me remove the general crappiness from my writing, and now I think I can write more non-crap than crap, and am hoping that within a few months, I'll minimalise the crap totally...


Just keep on writing. That's the only way to help it

 

I once read somewhere that you can do just about ANYTHING for fifteen minutes. If you know you need to write, start and commit to fifteen minutes. Don't cheat, actually write for those fifteen minutes, but give yourself permission to stop after your time is up. Often just getting started is enough to jump start your creativity and motivation.

 

Hey folks,

I have an awful time getting my projects up and running. I ideas, sure, but it's never an easy take-off... or flight, for that matter.

I was just wondering what you all had to offer with starting off a story (novel or short story of any genre)? Do you find yourself just writing and seeing where it takes you? Do you have some mathematical plan that allows you a smooth start? Do you rough draft the whole story before you set finger to keyboard?

And then, once the story is started (when I do get wheels off the runway), I cannot seem to maintain the story line for some stories for very long. Any tips with this?

As you can see, I am a writer that needs heavy molding. Any help would be much appreciated! Thank you.

 

Try writing brief summaries of your scenes out beforehand. ie:

1. Jack and Jill are going up the hill to fetch a pail of water so they can put out a bushfire
2. Jill realizes there is no water in the well; flashback scenes of the drought on Fairy Tale Land and the effects it has been having on the citizens.
3. Jack, seeing that the fire is going to claim them all, grabs Jill and makes passionate love to her in the light of the flames.
4. The fire destroys Fairy Tale Land; show citizens dying (The scene of Humpty Dumpty being cooked should be particularly exciting)
5. Hundreds of years later, aliens come across the ruins of the city and wonder what kind of people used to live here.

--

....or something like that. =P
Just briefly plan out your scenes and you'll find the directions and plots of the book beginning to connect together, and hopefully come to a conclusion. From there on, it's only a matter of inflating the outline with a bunch of words to make your story.

 

I agree with Ivan. If you have a basic plot worked out you should take the next step and state what you would like to happen.

Being organized makes writing a whole lot easier. When you have a clutter mess of ideas it is not that easy to work, now is it?

 

I've never finished a lengthy story, but I do see a process forming that is turning what started as a short story into a much longer one.

I began a story recently with one scene in mind. In order to write that scene, I needed some back story, and I needed a character. Once I wrote the back story and began to form the character, the back story was showing signs of being very very rushed, so I began to expand it. This led to a need for a couple of additional characters, and I also started to see that the story itself needed to go somewhere beyond that scene. That is bringing in a need for more characters, and my central character has picked up some traits that are beginning to drive the story as well.

All this started from a scene and a character. I hadn't planned the story to be big, but it is starting to look like it may need to become a novel. Frankly it scares the hell out of me. But maybe it will provide part of an answer to your question.

 

I often start from a scene, first building the background and characters, then I start to write some scenes, creating some type of plot from that.

Generally, how an idea starts out for me is a small idea that won't leave me alone.

Take Balance, I saw that idea turn up in a type of dream, wrote the scene, and wall pulled in.

 

Therein is the problem. Though you need to consider your audience, you should write for yourself. If you read what you have written and believe you have expressed yourself well then you have served your readers.

 

I try to write for the simple pleasure of it.

Of course, if I have an idea that won't leave me, I try to write it out of my system.

The thing is, I have got scenes I know I won't use, yet I write them any, why? Because I feel it doesn't matter what you write, as long as you do your best. Having read a large portion of the fantasy out there, I know most of it is crap, and I dare say my work will fit into that catagory.

This doesn't stop me because I try to produce the best possible story I can. I think some of it is down to inner confidence, conifdence that you an write a story that others will like, and if no-ones does, guess what? You wrote it, and that's something to be proud of.

 

Once you have a page written (or even less) and you don't like it. Just don't scrap it! Find out what's wrong with it and see if you can improve it. Thats what I do.

 

This is exactly why I write about things I've experienced. I don't need an outline. I don't need to think about what comes next. The memories are already there.

 

I usually go wherever my mind takes me, but I always have a ten-scene tool sitting next to me (Any and all stories have ten basic scenes. Try it.) to help myself from overwriting or getting off track.

Ten Scene Tool:

1. Opener *duh
2. Point of No Return Complication --aka PNRC-- *where your character cannot ever go back to how things were beforehand.
3-8. Your most defining complications.
9. Climax *duh
10. Conclusion *duh

Good luck!

 

Here's my theory, and has been for some time:

Writing is way overrated. You edit and revise until your tenth draft reads like an effortless first.

It goes something like that. I got it from a book called The Writer's Little Helper, by Smith.

Look into the book. It will really help you! I got it a couple of years ago, when I realized I was doing more telling than showing in my stories, which is exactly the opposite of what I want to do. Now I show automatically.

Dont worry about what others think. Write for the sheer pleasure of writing. Revise and revise just for the thrill that you can make magic with the words you choose; you can affect someone's world! Once you're story reads wonderfully (and that can takeyears, believe me), you wont be so self concious.

Hehe, and maybe you should try writing on paper, like I do, so you can't delete your work!

Good luck!

 

It's all you need, to enjoy it, I think Pratchett really enjos writing, don't you?

I personally don't like those books that tell you how to write, reading them seems counter productive.

 

Hey guys, I've had writer's block for about... eighteen years now, and I haven't been able to finish a single story. So, to counter this I'm wondering if anyone knows where to get a fantasy plot generator, that way I can just write a story with little to no thought to it as a sort of an ice breaker for my brain.

I found this one so far, but I wish it was a teensy bit more detailed. Serendipity

 

My friend, as hard as it might sound, you were never born to be a writer.

Eighteen years? You're kidding me right?

 

sometimes I think that myself. I've got a relatively good story bouncing around in my head; rewrote it twice with the most recent rough draft at one hundred seventeen pages, but it goes too fast and trails off awkwardly with a forty year old soldier traveling with the 17 or-so year old protagonist and his female friend for no reason (liek, not creepy, totally). And then a war that isn't necessary. So that means a giant third rewrite.
And a rewrite is not what I want to do, because I'm still stuck somewhere in between running away from people who want to kill your girlfriend and giant climactic battle against an organization who wants to change history so that their lives don't suck.

Yeah, for the most part. But I've still never finished anything. It's that middle part and pacing that gets me.

 

Start on a smaller project first. This may help you practice some aspects of story-writing without as much commitment to the piece. Also, rewriting isn't as much of a hassle. Just something to think about.

 

That's why I'm thinking about writing a stereotypical story with a dark villian and a magic ring and all those tropes and trappings, but very little heart. I feel if I can just finish something I'll be able to break out of the rut I've been in forever. Hence the need for a plot generator or a prompt.

 

Why don't you just rewrite a fairy tale, or some other story you know well? Since you won't have to learn a new story, you'll be acquainted with more of the aspects established.

 

No, brother--write a memoir or a nonfiction piece, something that happened to you in real life. Put down all you thoughts and feelings, and all your emotions you felt at exactly that moment.

In other words: do some journal writing.

Or write a diary.