I discovered that I’d headed in the wrong direction yesterday, to the tune of about 1000 words. Didn’t cut the words. Just looked at the situation, decided that I could save the dialogue and simply relocate the scene to a different location.
Wrote a note to myself to do that [in brackets, like this], put in a # sign to indicate a new scene, and picked up where I should have left off yesterday.
And the writing has flown today, with Catri and Genna doing something they are SO not supposed to be doing, and the outcome of it going to have immense repercussions.
Today, the writing is great fun. That it wasn’t yesterday should have told me something then.
InkGypsy and Jess–When it’s not fun, I know I’m doing it wrong.
If a scene feels chore-like, then I don’t have to have it. It’s the wrong scene, and I need to plot a different one.
I love reading these novel writing updates! Definitely excited about reading the book when it’s done but I also love seeing how you discover things and deal with problems that come up. You mentioned in a podcast that you write ‘all the fun bits and leave the boring stuff out’ (so, by extension, you know when it’s boring it’s not right) – what about when you know you have to have a certain scene but it still feels chore-like? I find changing POVs helps sometimes but not always – especially if you’ve already written those ‘candy bar’ scenes before and after.
I’m also curious about Jess’ question.
Thanks for sharing Holly – it’s always inspiring.
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LOL PolarBear, great analogy.
May I ask how you knew you were wrong and where you should be? I have SO much trouble with this. I’ll know when the writing’s not quite right, but not why or how to fix it.
We were just talking about being in areas where the GPS signal gets scattered today. Sometimes that happens in the writing, too, and you find yourself driving in the middle of a field. Thankfully, it wasn’t over a cliff!
I love seeing how much fun you have writing this book. It makes me really excited to read it — if you’re excited to read it, I know I’m gonna be excited to read it.
Happy to hear things are moving for you! I have a silly question for you, though, totally unrelated…
In your various clinics and PDFs… what FONT are you using? I’m trying to create my own first small report, and I want something easy to read, but I don’t want it to be so huge that it looks like I’m using it as a filler.
Cheers,
Heather