Tag: writer's block

Oh, this should work perfectly

Jon ChaissonLeave a comment

Every now and again I’ll figure out a long-standing block in my current project, and in the process, I’ll be of two minds about it: one, that this unexpectedly clears the path for everything else to run smoothly…and two, that it’ll be a hell of a lot more work than expected. I suppose it’s the variant on the angel and devil on your shoulders bit, really. You feel thrilled that this one problem has finally gone away, but you don’t want to fully trust it just yet.

This has happened twice recently with Theadia, actually. Late last month I’d come to the conclusion that the problem I’d had with a certain character had nothing to do with their actions or what I needed them to do…it was that the character didn’t work. They were just…boring the hell out of me. I hated writing them and initially thought it was because it was a scene I ultimately would not need. That didn’t quite feel right to me, however. The clarity came when I decided that maybe I should have their actions be played by a character I had a bit more interest in but had woefully underused. And LO! It actually worked! These new passages are still a bit weak and in need of revision, but I’m not too worried about that — right now I just want to get the scenes done and written.

The second time was just a week or so ago, when I FINALLY came up with a plausible ending for the novel. This was just like The Balance of Light, in that I knew how I wanted the story to end, but I wasn’t exactly sure how I was going to get there. Thankfully there was no years-long block this time, only a general I’ll get to it when I get to it avoidance. Suffice it to say, I happened to have the day off then, and allowed myself to ruminate over this bit of clarity for a bit to work it out. After about an hour or two, I had a pretty good idea of how I was going to play this out.

As of this moment, I am focusing mostly on the first revelation, as they are the main character of nearly all the ‘WRITE THIS LATER’ scenes I’d skipped over the last year or so. This is actually working for the best, as I’m able to expand on this new character organically, just like I had with the other mains. And once that is taken care of, I can finally finish the novel properly.

And everything will fall into place perfectly.

I hope.

Keeping Up

Jon ChaissonLeave a comment

I’ve actually been pretty good with the 750 Words these days! Once again, it’s mainly because I’m using it for a specific single purpose instead of trying to write something new every day. [In this case, I’m low-key doing a bit of ongoing personal writing tied in with a not-quite-trunked, still-on-the-backburner project, but y’all probably know what it is anyway.] I’m lucking out because the writing I’m doing for it is super easy, and I can hit the numbers I want in about twenty minutes, leaving me with a perfect amount of time for the blogging and work on MU4.

Speaking of MU4, the day after I posted Monday’s entry here, I came to the conclusion that the only way I’d be able to break this low-stakes mindset is to do a complete one-eighty. My first thought was: you want tension? I’ll give you some f***ing tension. I realized I couldn’t just build up to it: I had to make it happen, and make it happen now. An ultimate oh shit moment. And I ran with it.

And it worked! This was exactly the push I needed to get this novel back on track, to give it the boost it so desperately needed. I already know I’m going to need to do some heavy revision of the previous six chapters at some future point to make it work, but that’s par for the course anyway. The important thing here is that I’m right where I need to be again. Now all I have to do is keep it going!

Updates and whatnot

Jon ChaissonLeave a comment

First on the docket: FREE BOOKS!

Yes, it’s that time of year again, and all five of my ebooks are available for free until the first of January over at Smashwords! Here are the links:

In My Blue World
Meet the Lidwells! A Rock n’ Roll Family Memoir
The Mendaihu Universe Book 1: A Division of Souls
The Mendaihu Universe Book 2: The Persistence of Memories
The Mendaihu Universe Book 3: The Balance of Light

All five books are available in multiple formats, so you can read on any PC, laptop, or ereader! Because I like looking out for y’all.

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Second of all: chances are I might not have too much to ramble on about in the next few weeks as I’m most likely going to just keep busy offline with my other projects as well as celebrating the holidays, so if you don’t see any posts in the next few Monday/Friday go-rounds, that’s the reason. It’s not that I’m busy, it’s that I’m enjoying not being busy!

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I’m happy to say that late last night I came up with an idea that could significantly improve the opening of MU4, which I’ve been struggling with the last few weeks. As usual, it revolves around my penchant for starting the story at the wrong time! Of course, I’d already logged off, and had even turned off the bedside light to go to sleep when it came to me, but thankfully I was able to remember it this morning, so that will be part of today’s work. Yay for breaking through a block!

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I’m still plowing through my music bios and it looks like I’m down to maybe 15 unread books at this point, which blows my mind. I never thought I’d be that caught up! Speaking of reading, I’ve done a factory reset of my e-reader (somehow the keyboard had stopped working) which wiped a number of apps that I’d had on there that I probably didn’t need and never used, but on the plus side, I’ve filled it up with a number of cheap or free e-books that I plan on hitting next year. My average books-per-year has hovered around 70 or so and I’d like to up that. (Why so low? Primarily because over the last few years I’ve been spending a considerable amount of reading-in-bed time doing project revision, and that can take up to a few weeks at a time. I currently do not have any projects at that level at this point.) I can zip through a good-sized book in a few days so for next year’s GoodReads challenge I think I’ll set it at 100 and see how far I get.

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Speaking of reading, what was my favorite books I read this year? Good question. I’ll need to refer to my GoodReads list and get back to you on that. That could be a good post in itself!

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…and that’s all I have for now. Hope everyone has a lovely Christmas holiday!

Working on it

Jon ChaissonLeave a comment

The Theadia project is turning out to be a tougher nut to crack than I’d expected, but at least I’ve learned from experience now that I shouldn’t let that bother me too much. I’ve been spending some of my Daily Words playing around with the plot and searching for the right story that needs telling. It’s very similar to the issues I had with Diwa & Kaffi.

So instead of forcing the story into shape against its will, I’m going the alternate, less stressful route: letting it come to me naturally. And given that this is probably the third or fourth time in a row where I’ve encountered this, perhaps this has become my current style of writing and creating. It takes longer, but there are far fewer dead ends to contend with.

In the meantime, I’m letting myself play around with a few other projects, one of which has been on the Spare Oom back burner for ages, just to keep the writing muscles in shape. I’m not taking them entirely seriously — well, I am, but I haven’t assigned any deadlines or hard stops as of yet.

As long as I’m moving forward, yeah?