How I write
First of all, the answer is yes. I really do an overwhelming majority of the work on my novels on the train (that’s the Commuter Rail for locals). So what is my process?
The first step in writing something new for me is always inspiration—a walk in the woods, a snippet of music, a particularly majestic sunrise or sunset. Or a dream. My wife can tell you that I will sometimes wake up in the middle of the night, grab my phone from the nightstand and furiously type away at it with whatever incredible* idea had formed in my head. I can also recall a time, many years ago, when I stumbled frantically in the dark to find a pen and something to write on. Unfortunately, the gibberish I managed to scribble onto a box of tissues that night was never satisfactorily translated.
But what comes after the inspiration? For me, I need to write down the basics of my idea. Maybe it’s just the faintest hint of a plot. Maybe it’s a character who pops, almost fully formed, into my thoughts. But even still, I want to write down whatever is occurring to me in that moment. Because I know that I am all-too-capable of losing something essential if I don’t write it down. So . . . step one: write everything down!
Then . . . it’s usually the case that I will want to let the creative spirit take me and I will simply write—without any kind of planning. (In writing circles they call people who write this way “pantsers”. Because they write from the seat of their pants!) And I’ll do that until I run out of steam. Basically, I want the inspiration to carry me as far as it will of its own volition. Then, when I hit my first wall and the words cease to flow . . . I will plan. I will rack my brain to envision where this character is headed, what their personal challenges might be, what conflicts they might face in a larger world, etc. In extreme cases, I will do a full outline. But this is essentially the tipping point for me from when I go from being a pantser, to a “plotter”—someone who tries to plan out as much as possible in advance before I write any further.
For me, plotting is hard. But the power of plotting is that all of the effort I’ve put into laying down the skeleton of what I am going to write reaps a huge reward when I can just sit down and rip out 1,000 words on a train ride in to the office! There is no feeling like it under the sun when the story is just flowing through your fingertips, into the keyboard, and onto the screen like that.
I was in a holding pattern back in September after I’d submitted my manuscript to a literary agent who represents some of the top talent in the fantasy genre right now. And I didn’t want to spend any significant time on The Crafter’s Son against the possibility that he might decide he was interested. So I decided to do the NaNoWriMo challenge on an undeveloped idea I had been percolating for some time. I was really cooking along—averaging about the 1500 words a day they want you to maintain to achieve 50,000 in thirty days. That felt so good! And then I hit a wall. To some extent I lost steam because my personal life crept in and kept distracting me from the prize. And to another extent I hadn’t sufficiently plotted my NaNoWriMo idea to be able to sustain the pace. If I had plotted more, and longer, I think I’d have easily maintained the pace for the full thirty days and likely come up with a finished novel at the end. Lesson learned for me.
So . . . as with so many things in life: avoiding writers block is always a balance. For me, unless the creative spirit is really flowing, I need to force myself to plot. And if I’ve sketched things out sufficiently well, I can unleash the pantser inside me to finish the job.
Until next time . . .
*Variously, and all too often, the ideas are 1) weird and unworkable, 2) unintelligible by the light of day, or 3) not nearly so compelling as they seemed at 2:00am!