A Writer's Tale

You may be surprised and delighted to discover how easily the words flow if you skip the preliminaries and start your tale at the moment the trouble first rears its head.

Another possible cure for difficulties in getting started on a new project is to change the point of view. Time and time again, I’ve had problems with a new novel until I realized that I was trying to tell it from the wrong viewpoint. Some stories might require third-person viewpoints of multiple characters, while other stories might call for a first-person viewpoint. Sometimes, just realizing that you have to tell it in a very subjective first-person voice instead of in third person can make all the difference and clear away your writer’s block.

You may be starting to tell your story at the right point in time, and using the best possible viewpoint, but then run into difficulties because you’re planning to focus your plot on the wrong character. You run into the block because you know something isn’t right but you don’t know what.

When making my preliminary notes for After Midnight, I thought my story would be about a teenaged boy looking out his bedroom window at night and seeing a mysterious young woman lingering in his back yard. Though I made quite a few pages of notes about where to go from there, I felt wrong about it. But suddenly I thought, What if we reverse roles? A woman looking out her window sees a mysterious guy! It changed everything, and I knew it would work.

When trying to develop The Stake, I figured to have a man find a stake-in-the-heart body while digging a hole in his back yard. From there, however, the plot was pretty much up for grabs. I didn’t know where to take it until the notion popped into my head that the man should be a horror writer. After that, everything fell into place as if pre-ordained.

Trying to develop Out Are The Lights, I had nothing more than a book about a movie theater showing snuff films until I realized the potential of making my main character deaf.

Moby Dick was probably a pretty ho-hum idea for a book until Melville decided to take away one of Ahab’s legs.

My suggestion to get past the block: ask yourself how the story might go if you made it happen to someone else. Play with the ages of your characters, their genders, their careers, special interests, etc. You may stumble onto a notion that will suddenly bring your story to life and blast away your writer’s block.

After you’ve decided that your story is starting at the best point in time, that you’ve found the right point of view and that you’ve selected a terrific cast of characters something else may be still prevent you from getting started.

But you don’t know what.

My advice is to sit down at your pad of paper, typewriter or keyboard and simply play around with your story. Don’t try to write it. just toy with it. Ask yourself what sort of events you envision taking place. Who does what to whom? What leads to what? Just fool around for a while and see what happens.

More than likely, you’ll very quickly astound yourself by discovering what you want to do, where you want to go.

So then you immediately go to a new page, write “Chapter One,” and have at it.

If all else fails, do what Hemingway said.

Begin your story by writing one true sentence. Then follow it with another. And keep adding sentences. Don’t worry about where they are taking you just follow them. Soon, you’ll find yourself telling a story.

If you run into a block in the midst of a project, you should stop and think. Somewhere nearby, you probably took a wrong turn. You made something happen that shouldn’t have happened. You had the wrong character do something. You forgot to put in a necessary scene. You’re letting the plot bog down.

Or you’re about to head off in a bad direction and the block is trying to warn you off.

All you need to do is identify the problem, find the better way to go, and go there. You’ll leave the block behind.

In many cases, writer’s block is actually your friend. It warns you of something wrong about the story you’re writing or about to write.

All you need to do is determine the source of the problem.

When you correct the problem, that form of writer’s block will vanish and you’ll be able to plunge on ahead.

The key, always, is to plunge on ahead.

Let nothing stop you.

On Rejection

REJECTION SLIPS ARE BADGES OF HONOR.

Purple Hearts.

They mean that you’ve done your duty. You’ve written your stuff and sent it out. You’ve done your part.

Show me a writer who doesn’t have a stack of rejection slips and I’ll show you an unpublished writer.

The rejections can feel like a kick in the stomach when you get them, but they are part of the life. They’re the receipts you get in the mail each time you pay your dues.