Novel Writer's Toolkit: Revised Edition

Last section for Tool 7: Writer's Block

Defeating Writer’s Block

On the whole, I have to honestly say most often when I grind to a halt, I am committing the sin of procrastination rather than my creative juices have run dry.   

What Is Writer’s Block?

Laziness.  

95% of the time.  Yep.  Get out the bum glue.

Right brain/left brain conflict.  

Your right brain is your creative side.  Your left brain is the editorial side.  Whichever one is dominant that morning, will determine whether you feel you wrote brilliance or dreck the previous day as you re-read it.  Ignore both and just write.  It will turn out the same.

Subconscious telling you to stop.  

This is the 5%.  This is when you feel bad for several days about the way the book is going.  Something is wrong and you need to put the brakes on and figure out what you’re screwing up.

Ways To Overcome The "Block"

Have a good outline.  Since you've already poured a lot of creativity into your outline, you can usually keep pushing ahead.

As the commercial says:  Just do it.  Just write.  It might be awful but at least it's something other than a blank page.

Work on something else for a while.  Looking up at my work board, right now I have (remember this example is from a while back, but you get the idea):

One manuscript on the market at a publisher.

A screenplay getting read by a producer for rewrite.

Two concepts for third books to follow two two-book contracts with major publishers that need to be outlined in time for a new contract.

Two new ideas that I'm researching and beginning to outline.

Two manuscripts getting edited at publishing houses and due back in the next month for more work.

As you can tell, I have so much else going on that I value the time I can spend focused on simply writing.  But if I do get a block, I have plenty of other things to work on, including this book.  It has been written over a fifteen-year span now going from about eleven manuscript pages on the first draft to over three hundred and fifty.

If you are sure that you need to pause to rethink where your novel is heading, give what you have to someone for feedback.  Talk to other people.  Clear you head.  Free associate.  Turn everything in your novel around and look at it from another perspective.  Do some more research.  Scream.  Pound your forehead into your keyboard.  Look back through the manuscript for those subconscious seeds you’ve planted that you can now cultivate and harvest to keep the book moving forward and tighten it down.

Then write.

The Danger of Perfectionism

You could edit out subconscious seeds if you are constantly editing yourself.  Just write and get to the end of the first draft.  Then work on editing.

You might end up cutting perfectly edited work that you now have wasted time on.

Some people do a lot of rewriting to avoid moving forward.  If you enjoy the process more than the end result, you will have a tendency to do this.

Nothing is ever done:  sometimes you just have to stop

Bottom line:  the next book will be better

Show Don’t Tell and Symbolism

You’ve Heard It, What Does It Mean?

If you’ve ever attended a writing class or conference, “Show, don’t tell” has fallen upon your ears again and again.  What exactly does it mean?

First, let me say that it isn’t completely true all the time.  There are indeed times in a novel when you should tell.  In fact, telling is one of the advantages a novelist has over a screenwriter who must stay completely in the showing mode.

Also, the line between showing and telling is non-existent at times.  It’s a sliding scale.  At one end (telling) is pure exposition; at the other end (showing) is dramatization.  Telling tends to summarize information, giving it secondhand.  Showing allows you to see, hear, feel, smell and taste, first-hand.

Some things to keep in mind when considering whether to show or tell.

Don’t Do Information Dumps

Too often people lead with information rather than plot.  Information should only be given to the reader when it is absolutely necessary at that moment for the reader to understand the plot.  Too many writers give information too soon and the reader doesn’t know why they are being given this material.  

Also, many people open a book with a nice opening line or paragraph and then suddenly go into memory or flashback or info-dump.  My recommendation is that if you have a memory or flashback in your opening chapter, you are starting the book in the wrong place. 

Match The Two To The Inherent Pace Of Your Story

If you have a fast-moving thriller, a lot of telling can really slow down the story.  On the other hand, if you are writing a multi-generational family saga, there will probably be a lot of telling.  Also, mix the two.  If the reader gets too much telling, they might get bored; too much action might overwhelm.  You can balance the story by using both.

Always Show Action

Don’t have your action occur ‘off-stage’.  Summarized action is boring.  Play action out in real time in front of the reader.

Always Show The Climax Of The Book

And have your protagonist and antagonist in the scene.

Symbolism

Remember those literature classes where the teacher went on about Faulkner’s use of the color yellow in Soldier’s Pay?  Did they call it symbolism?  

The example I’m going to use is Richard Russo’s superb book Nobody’s Fool.  It was also made into an excellent movie, from which Paul Newman was nominated for an Oscar.

The opening of the book is several pages spent on the old trees overlooking the main street in the town the story is set in.  The trees were once the pride of main street but now they are old and diseased and the people who live there fear them, that an unexpected branch will collapse on their house or them.  This foreshadows a large part of the story.  The trees are a symbol for the way the entire town has become.

Then there is the symbol for conflict.  The main character, Sully, has a running feud with a man he worked for, Carl.  So Sully steals Carl’s new snow blower.  And Carl steals it back.  And Sully steals it once more.  And in the process Sully accidently poisons Carl’s dog, which Carl gives to Sully at the end, a symbol of Sully having changed because he now can take care of something/someone else.

Some symbols are most blunt.  Sully hates his departed father.  Every time he drives by the cemetery where his father is buried, Sully gives the grave the finger.

Symbolism, to tie it in with the first part of this chapter, is how we show things to the reader, rather than tell them.