writer’s block

I don’t actually believe in ‘writer’s block’.

Or, rather, what I think that throwing the term ‘writer’s block’ around is like calling an illness ‘a bug’. Yes, there’s something wrong, yes, writing hasn’t happened… but usually I can pinpoint the symptoms. I haven’t started the chapter because I know what happens, it’s a big, important scene, and I’m scared of it falling short to what’s in my head. I can’t keep going because something doesn’t feel right. I have no idea what happens next. I can’t keep going because I’m really taken by this idea for a different story.

Or, this week’s ailment: I plotted out the chapter, tried to go too fast, and did too much action in summary. Everything feels wrong now, and my stomach turns when I look over it. I need to slow down, go back, work things out in scene, because narration isn’t cutting it this time.

Back to the start of chapter eleven.

2 thoughts on “writer’s block

  1. Kindof. I jotted some things down on paper the first time around, then promptly lost it… I tend to call my NaNo version my ‘outline.

    I did a real outline a few chapters into the story, just to keep myself on track for the rewrite. But my characters keep breaking it, so every three chapters or so I have to go back to the outline (or, a bullet-list of events) and reevaluate it for the next chapters. That seems to be working so far.

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