As promised for NaNoWriMo, I’m organizing all my past content so that YOU can more easily find what you’re looking for. During week 1, I covered A Writer’s Basic Toolbox, and in week 2, I dug deeper into the more advanced tools at a writer’s disposal. Week 3 was for The Productive Writer, and this week, we’re moving onto fear, writer’s block, and […]
As I promised last week, we are finally going to befriend the FRABs (Fear-Related Artistic Blocks) for good. No more yelling at them or shoving the poor guys aside–we’re hugging them close this week. In fact, we’re not just embracing our FRABs, we’re going to learn from them and use them as fuel in our […]
I’m back! Happy 2013, everyone! I had an excellent (and incredibly productive) holiday season, and I am just so excited to tackle this new year. As I promised back in December, I’ve been working on a series of blog posts that specifically address the “fear factor” in writer’s block. I feel pretty awful for not […]
Last Friday, I talked about my first go-to method when I inevitably get stuck in a draft. I lay out my character’s emotional dominoes and see where they ought to fall (which is often not where I’ve made them fall)… But that trick doesn’t always work. Sometimes it’s not an emotional/goal issue that’s halted my […]
I tend to have a lot of false starts or write-my-characters-into-inescapable-corners when I’m drafting. It doesn’t matter how meticulously I outline or how freely I try to fly by the seat of my pants, I always get stuck at some point. Maybe what I’d thought should come next (and what I had written on my pretty […]
Writing constipation–a phrase I first heard from Anna Banks (author of Of Posiedon). Typically, people use the phrase to refer to having too many ideas to isolate and then write…but honestly, sorting through all my ideas has never been a problem for me. Wading through and then getting the story ideas onto a page is […]
After breathing, eating, sleeping, and seeing ONLY my novella for a few weeks, I finally managed to cross the finish. Remember that draft I mentioned doing in my last post? Draft #3? Well, I was finally onto something there…but it still wasn’t right. It took me one more almost complete rewrite…but at least THAT draft was it. And […]
I have vanished from the blogosphere…and twitter is all but abandoned as well. Even emails are backed up so badly, it will take days to unknot and answer them all. That’s alright, though. Why? Because I had an epiphany recently thanks to a little old TV show I adore: Parks and Recreation. But allow me to […]
When life kinda sucks, it affects your work. Everyone knows this, right? When life kinda sucks and your job is a creative one, it really affects your work. Whether we like it or not, our creative mojo is heavily influenced by what’s going on in our lives. It’s one thing to be busy–you don’t have the time […]
Note: this post is (sort of) a continuation of If It Doesn’t Fit, Don’t Force It, and When the Glass Isn’t Half-Full. A few people have asked how I managed to get my writing “swing” back, and I gave a brief rundown in the comments last week. I thought I’d go into a tad more […]