After The Swan Bonnet reached the HarperCollins Editor Desk at Authonomy.com, I began a total rewrite. An agent had expressed interest and I wanted to do something about my protagonist being among so many adult characters. I made her a few years older and added chapters. Never having added chapters to a work that way, I worried that I might not be able to jump in and imagine them. These are ideas for jumpstarting your story.
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1. Sleep
on it. Literally doing that might
help. I haven't actually slept with the
manuscript under my pillow but I've slept with it near my head. I've found written notes in my bed. Creative writing often emerges from the unconscious
as dreaming does. When I first began
writing, I used to put my typewriter in its case because I tended to brood on
my story. Over a fresh day and during
sleep, I collected thoughts about my WIP.
Often, the hurdle I couldn’t jump was no longer there the next morning.
2. Revise
into your blank page. Ernest
Hemingway said that he typed at least the last paragraph he wrote the previous
day before writing a new paragraph. It
might seem wasteful but I often find that retyping a page or more improves the
flow. However perfect a writer is as a
typist, they hardly ever write down the perfect paragraph the first time. If a person has a busy day ahead, they might
have trouble landing down to the next sentence in the WIP.
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3. Do some
fact checking. Solve some concrete
details in the WIP. You have an idea of your character's taste in clothing,
cars, or food. Go shopping for her or
him, even if it's in another time period.
Look up information about your setting or find facts that build on an
event or scene. Write it down. Describe.
Did you know that Margaret Mitchell wrote a character study - an
individual history of every character in Gone with the Wind - before she
began the book?
4. Free
write. Before I begin anything, I
usually get out a pen and simply write on notebook paper about my project. You can free-write at any time. Take a fresh page and let yourself go. Write around your next page. Speculate on character responses or
"might-have-beens" in your WIP.
Something behind the story might be preventing the story from simmering.
5. Change
your surroundings. Some writers pick
up and change place. I felt unleashed
when I first got a laptop. I could write
in any room and in comfortable positions.
Once, writers used portable typewriters but electric typewriters and PCs
put them through a desk period. Now with
a tablet that came with a small keyboard, I can write anywhere, as long as I'm not trying for speed. Alone, a writer might become too self-conscious. In most jobs, we work around and with other
people. The solitary time of writing can
become a lazy time.
And
here in Northern Minnesota, I often take time off in the summer. Our summers are so precious that I can easily
abscond from the writing habit.
Somehow, when school begins, I focus again but I might need a
jumpstart. Looking back on writing I’d
done, I wasn’t sure that the grind was a good thing. Discipline is, but taking time to gather the
thoughts and absorb the present is a part of the creative process. Writing again, well, hopes are that the
keyboard is that bicycle and a writer
might whizz on it when they want to.
The Swan Bonnet is on a blog tour this month! Here are the blog stops from As You Wish Tours, blogs to check out for books, reviews, and new releases.
Tour Schedule
| Aug 10 | Julia | Hendrix | As You Wish Reviews |
| Aug 11 | Crystal | Allmon | Out There Reviews & Stuff |
| Aug 12 | Ann | Snizek | Rambling Voices In My Head |
| Aug 13 | Cheree | Crump | Confessions of the Paranormal |
| Aug 14 | Kelly | Powell | Kelly P's Blog |
| Aug 15 | RaeBeth | Buda | The Writing World |
| Aug 16 | Cassie | Chavez | Sassy Cassie's Reviews |
| Aug 17 | S.Cu'Anam | Policar | Cu's Ebook Giveaways |
| Aug 18 | Melissa | Baker | Buried Under Books |
| Aug 19 | Andrea | Buginsky | Andi's Realm |
| Aug 20 | Tina | Donnelly | Reading For Fun |
| Aug 21 | Christina | Irelan | Intoxicated by Books |
| Aug 22 | Itara | Sosa | My Midnight Fantasies |
| Aug 23 | Katherine | Holmes | GMTA |
