Don't Stop

Laurel K. Hamilton’s latest post is disappointing.

Whether she understands what she has written is a sign of weariness or not, it’s yet another post she shouldn’t have written (another, more recent one was a rant about ‘negative readers’).

Way back when LKH began blogging, she said she was going to do it as a diary of sorts so new and emerging authors could have glimpse into the life of a working professional writer.

Me, I was thrilled. I like to read working blogs, to read about the difficulties some authors have in creating their books; to have a look-see into such fertile imaginations.

But it has been a long time since LKH’s blog has been interesting – work-wise.

Now, she has confessed to a basic mistake new writers often make: stopping in the middle of a scene; an important one.

Rule number… um… whatever: do not stop writing until you are satisfied you are at a point you can continue from.

Authors use all sorts of tricks to continue. My personal favourite is in the middle of a sentence. Yes, that does seem to be a paradox if taken with the above comment. But remember this: if you stop in the middle of a sentence, you know exactly what was about to happen next without compromising the direction of your work. If you stop in the middle of a scene, a number of alternative scenarios can be created, taking you away from what direction you wanted to go – outline or not.

By giving yourself time to subconsciously think about the work, it can either lead to disaster or a better piece of work – usually, it’s a bust; especially if you’re not an outliner, and have been writing the same types of work for an extended length of time.

You have to trust yourself to know when to stop. I don’t think it’s a matter of words, either. Every author throws themselves into the characters, the scene, the book - or at least they should. It’s no good thinking that today’s aim is 4000 words and then stop; that way lies madness. Better to think, to plan ahead, to where your characters can safely stop. Write your characters into a safe place (whether it actually is, or a false sense of security).

You aren’t going to be writing a two day long battle, or sex scenes, or political discourse, or character description, or motivation – you really aren’t going to do that: it’s boring and tedious for the reader.

So, to plan your days writing, you have to work out how many scenes to write and what happens during those scenes. Then you’re done until tomorrow. It works like that until the book is done. You may write for three hours or six, or nine or twelve or however long it takes to get those scenes written, but you never stop because you’re ‘tired’: that tiredness will reflect in your written work and have to be taken out later, or completely re-written. Best to plan it first.

There. Simple, though not easy.

And how can I preach this when I’m an organic writer? A writer who doesn’t outline? Because when I start the day’s writing, I have an idea of where I want to stop at the end of the day. It’s sitting there, at the back of my mind, so I still have a target to reach. If I don’t think I can make that target, I write it down and select another more attainable target. That way, the continuity isn’t affected.