In today’s Journal
* Topic: When a Story Stalls
* Of Interest
Topic: When a Story Stalls
This is another topic I’ve touched on before, but it bears repeating. One of my mentoring students mentioned that sometimes his writing bogs down.
When that happens, I promise, the best thing you can do is trust your characters and just write the next sentence that occurs to you. Then write the next sentence, then the next and the next and the next, and soon the story will be flowing again. Simple as it sounds, this works almost every time.
If it doesn’t work, check one other thing: Sometimes the story stalls because you’ve written past the end of a scene or chapter or even the story or novel itself.
If you think that might be the problem, back up a few to several paragraphs and read what you’ve written. Often you’ll see where the scene or chapter ended.
If that’s the case, go ahead and start the next scene or chapter, then just write the next sentence and the next as described above. If it was the end of the story (or novel), of course, you can take a break and then start the next one.
Tomorrow, another technique I recently shared with a mentoring student.
By the way, no mentoring slots are currently available, but I’d be happy to put you on a waiting list if you want. Or you could sign up for the slightly less-expensive Extended Q & A.
Talk with you again soon.
Of Interest
See “Handheld laser device can quickly diagnose astronaut health in space” at http://r.smartbrief.com/resp/pvytCKiDunDtzMgBCifPauBWcNJbLc. Tricorder, anyone?
See “Serialization” at https://www.thepassivevoice.com/serialization/.
See “Flooded with AI-generated images…” at https://www.thepassivevoice.com/flooded-with-ai-generated-images-some-art-communities-ban-them-completely/. See PG’s take.
The Numbers
The Journal…………………………………… 280 words
Writing of (novel, tentative title)
Day 1…… XXXX words. Total words to date…… XXXX
Total fiction words for September……… 3277
Total fiction words for the year………… 69708
Total nonfiction words for September… 11790
Total nonfiction words for the year…… 140020
Total words for the year (fiction and this blog)…… 209728
Calendar Year 2022 Novels to Date…………………… 1
Calendar Year 2021 Novellas to Date……………… 0
Calendar Year 2021 Short Stories to Date… 0
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………………………………… 67
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)………………………………… 8
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)………………… 217
Short story collections……………………………………………… 31
Disclaimer: Along with discussing various aspects of the writing craft, I advocate a technique called Writing Into the Dark. WITD is “the only way” to write, but it is by far the easiest, most liberating, and most fun.
I’ve had a story stall out for a reason you didn’t list, Harvey.
Simply put – when I’ve injected myself into the story and a character says, “Hold up right there, missy!” They refuse to talk until I go back and figure out where I forced the story to go the way I wanted (for whatever STUPID reason I thought at the time seemed brilliant).
Once I fix wherever I didn’t honor THEIR voice(s), things move right along. Happens most often when I have too many distractions and, thus, end up walking away for a while and have WAY too much time to THINK about what SHOULD be next. Only rarely, when I’m able to just sit and write without breaking flow.
Oh, absolutely, Dawn. Thanks for bringing that up. And you explained it perfectly. I’ve actually added your comment to the archived copy of yesterday’s post.