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.
Do you do your outlining or drafting first on paper? Or do you write on your computer with just the mental outline of what you want the scene to be?
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.