Wrandom Writing Tip #4: What to do When You Don't Know

Tip #4:

Have you ever just hit a part in your book and stopped dead in your tracks?

You're like, Oh my goodness...what am I doing? Where am I going with this? What happens next?! AHG!

And then you run screaming to the nearest corner to hide your face in your hands and sob quietly?

Yeah, me too. And trust me, it passes.

Here's the thing about writing a book. Whether it's an epic 800-page novel or a heart-warming short story, eventually you will hit that one part you were trying to avoid. I like to call this part THE BLACK HOLE. It's usually in the middle, but sometimes it can be the beginning. Or the end.

There's nothing like that one moment when you hit that BLACK HOLE and your fingers freeze over the keyboard (or your pencil stops scratching on the page). You suddenly realize that the last four pages were completely dialogue, and that your characters are talking about baloney sandwiches when they should be out doing something else. What that something is, you may never ever know. But it's out there somewhere.

So, you freak out. You've been writing this for years and years and you've been doing so well, and now suddenly you think of all of the work before this point and cringe. How on earth did you manage to write such a sloppy bunch of random ideas? How bad can one ____.doc be?

This is something many writers face. I find myself in this situation while writing The Cycle of Time: The Sentinels (which, again, is what I was doing before I posted this). My characters are about to embark on an epic journey, but the time between the beginning of this journey and now is a BLACK HOLE. Dirco is being a sissy. Alli is an empty shell once again (from the empty shell she was born, and the empty shell will return to). I'm totally lost. I just want to skip to Eadën and get to his awesome complexes. But I can't do that! I'm a perfectionist and I have to do everything PERFECT and IN ORDER or else I will have an OCD ATTACK and THRASH AROUND and eventually I will end up DYING because my PAPERS are CUTTING ME OPEN and I will BLEED TO DEATH from all of the PAPER CUTS I receive from THRASHING from my OCD ATTACK. Now I'm perfectly aware some of you don't get like this. This is just me talking to myself.

So as before I digress into madness, I want to discuss what to do when you don't know.

How on earth do you get away from a BLACK HOLE? I've asked myself this many times. One of these times is right now. Another was about fifty-seven different times during The Journey, The Secret of Blackrock Cave, and...actually, The Deadlands never really did that.... But I digress again.

Here's how I cured mine.

1. Take time away from your novel and completely brainwash yourself from everything that has to do with it. You can do this by gorging yourself on Oreos, or listening to music until your ears fall out, or just taking a shower and shrugging it off. Anyways, a week or so usually works, but take more time if you're obsessive (like I am).

2. Go back after you've forgotten about it and read some of what you've already written. For me, this helps me look at if with fresh eyes and really enjoy what I've accomplished without worrying about my atrocious use of to-be verbs and my rebellious characters. It also gets me excited about writing it again!

If this doesn't work, extend treatment to the following:

3. Sit down and think. Bring a pad of paper and a pencil with you, because you might have a brilliant idea that flies the coop once you think it. Try to focus on the BLACK HOLE point and brainstorm random conflict. Even if it has nothing to do with the story. (i.e. sandstorm, earthquake, armies attacking, car crash, lost job, etc.) You may find a way to link the seemingly random conflict in a totally awesome way (just for inspiration, my whole book The Journey was made from random conflict and ended up linking so beautifully!).

4. Write whether you like it or not. You may not want to, but the more you write, the more you'll want to. Even if you end up deleting everything you write, at least you wrote something. Besides, you may come up with something as you write.

I hope this helps you as much as it helps me.

Keep calm and write on!

~Anastasia