I hope you’re finding time to write in these busy, often overwhelming times!
Please share what’s most concerning to you at this juncture in your writing. Don’t hold back. There’s no such thing as too-small (or too large!) a question.
Looking forward to reading your responses! And maybe tackling a few questions …
I am writing a YA novel. I took a very helpful class and studied Save The Cat! Writes A Novel till I felt like I knew it by heart. I also read vast quantities of YA. But my specialty is short and flash fiction. So my question is: How will I write all those pages, figure out the correct pacing, hold the suspense and create twists and turns as well as emotional relationship between characters over a couple hundred pages?
Ah, you've just beautifully described what it takes to write a novel!! It can be very overwhelming when you think of it in aggregate like that. The truth is that a novel gets written slowly, one sentence, one scene, one chapter at a time. Please trust that over time--and it usually takes a lot longer than we expect--if you continue to bear down on your novel with your interests, sensibilities, and obsessions, you will finish!! Please keep us posted!
I'm about 40k words into a historical fiction novel that takes place in the 1950's, in various places. I find that doing research slows the momentum of my writing, but I want to be as authentic and true do the times as possible. It's a much different process than writing contemporary fiction. I've written essays and short fiction up to now and I'm finding the novel writing process to be something totally different. I'm still struggling with finding what works best for me. Recently I decided to just write the scenes and make notes in the manuscript along the way at places where I need to do more research but not stopping then and there. We'll see if this works. Any helpful tips along these lines would be greatly appreciated.
Hola Jesus, I think your strategy makes a lot of sense. Keep the momentum going and put placeholders at junctures you need to revisit with more period detail. You might also consider spending part of a weekend day, for example, just doing research and harvest what you find in a separate notebook. This way you slowly accumulate the documentation and have it handy whenever you need it. Please let us know how it goes!
I'm currently in the post-project fog that comes with finishing a novel and I'm struggling to fill the creative void, meaning (I think) that I don't know what to do next. I KNOW that I have to start a new project, but nothing is calling to me like my previous project did. I've never finished a novel before, never started a second one, and I feel unmoored and adrift. Throw in the looming uncertainty of whether or not my previous project will find representation. If I'm honest, I'm struggling hard.
What should we do when we're in this publishing purgatory? How can we break free from this limbo and into a new project. How can I rekindle that spark (I feel like I'm describing about a relationship here)? I feel like I'm coping with a loss while simultaneously hoping to fall in love again!
Okay, that's where I'm at. Any and all advice is welcome!
Hola Alejandro, It's the hardest thing to WAIT for something to happen and muster up enough faith to start another, especially after something as monumental as a novel. And yet ... perhaps you can work on a different scale for a stretch? Poetry, perhaps, or essays, even a short story or two. It will distract you from the excruciation of waiting and remind you that you're still a writer--one word, one phrase, on glittering sentence at a time. Suerte!!
I am writing a YA novel. I took a very helpful class and studied Save The Cat! Writes A Novel till I felt like I knew it by heart. I also read vast quantities of YA. But my specialty is short and flash fiction. So my question is: How will I write all those pages, figure out the correct pacing, hold the suspense and create twists and turns as well as emotional relationship between characters over a couple hundred pages?
Ah, you've just beautifully described what it takes to write a novel!! It can be very overwhelming when you think of it in aggregate like that. The truth is that a novel gets written slowly, one sentence, one scene, one chapter at a time. Please trust that over time--and it usually takes a lot longer than we expect--if you continue to bear down on your novel with your interests, sensibilities, and obsessions, you will finish!! Please keep us posted!
I'm about 40k words into a historical fiction novel that takes place in the 1950's, in various places. I find that doing research slows the momentum of my writing, but I want to be as authentic and true do the times as possible. It's a much different process than writing contemporary fiction. I've written essays and short fiction up to now and I'm finding the novel writing process to be something totally different. I'm still struggling with finding what works best for me. Recently I decided to just write the scenes and make notes in the manuscript along the way at places where I need to do more research but not stopping then and there. We'll see if this works. Any helpful tips along these lines would be greatly appreciated.
Gracias,
Hola Jesus, I think your strategy makes a lot of sense. Keep the momentum going and put placeholders at junctures you need to revisit with more period detail. You might also consider spending part of a weekend day, for example, just doing research and harvest what you find in a separate notebook. This way you slowly accumulate the documentation and have it handy whenever you need it. Please let us know how it goes!
Hello All,
I'm currently in the post-project fog that comes with finishing a novel and I'm struggling to fill the creative void, meaning (I think) that I don't know what to do next. I KNOW that I have to start a new project, but nothing is calling to me like my previous project did. I've never finished a novel before, never started a second one, and I feel unmoored and adrift. Throw in the looming uncertainty of whether or not my previous project will find representation. If I'm honest, I'm struggling hard.
What should we do when we're in this publishing purgatory? How can we break free from this limbo and into a new project. How can I rekindle that spark (I feel like I'm describing about a relationship here)? I feel like I'm coping with a loss while simultaneously hoping to fall in love again!
Okay, that's where I'm at. Any and all advice is welcome!
Thanks for your time.
Hola Alejandro, It's the hardest thing to WAIT for something to happen and muster up enough faith to start another, especially after something as monumental as a novel. And yet ... perhaps you can work on a different scale for a stretch? Poetry, perhaps, or essays, even a short story or two. It will distract you from the excruciation of waiting and remind you that you're still a writer--one word, one phrase, on glittering sentence at a time. Suerte!!
* another project. * one (sorry for typos!)