3.1 The middle bits
First post for the new year and now we're looking at over a year of blog posts!
I'm actually shocked I've made it this long for blogging.
Anyway, recently I conducted a poll on twitter to find out which part people found the hardest for writing their manuscript. Unsurprisingly, it was overwhelmingly 'the middle.'
I know some folk struggle with the beginning and end, I certainly fall into the 'endings are tough' category and have a tendency to rush them as a result.
Whatever steam they had when they started the novel, it now runs out, or blocks up and words become a grind to produce. I hate to tell you this, but that problem never goes away. Your momentum may push you through a little past the middle but inevitably we all hit what athlete's call 'the wall.'
Your ability to push past that wall and finish is what seperates writers from authors, in my humble opinion. An author has finished a novel, a writer is in progress. I'm not dissing anyone on their first novel that is struggling through, nor am I saying that every single project must be finished. I recently looked at my litRPG novel of 40k progress and am considering dumping the whole hot mess. That's well over my usual halfway points.
Writing a novel is hard work. If it were easy, as one great author once said, everyone would do it. People believe it is easier than it looks, certainly. Practice makes some parts easier, but the 'wall' is in every good exercise routine and every good novel.
So what is the wall? For me, around the middle, my brain starts throwing out doubts, my soul, once carried on a flood of optimism and joy, has now met with the cold, hard reality that I must keep typing in order to reach the next milestone. I am tired of the novel, I've put days or weeks into it, can't I move on to a shiny, new idea? My muse is maybe screaming about shiny new options and I am consuming media outside of the apetite that led down the funnel to entice this novel.
I start having days where I can only manage 200 words.
I might be busy, uninspired, unwell, stressed from other places, whatever the cause, I cannot write today.
The plodding centre has hit.
Other authors describe this as the moment when they must sweat to force the words on the page, wrangling them out one letter at a time, as is the only method of wrangling words, afterall.
It is hard because writing is exercise for the brain, and no good exercise should be a breeze with no exertion.
I am afraid to say, there isn't a secret. Most writing is hard. The middle will be hard for most of us. Some people jump to the end and write that first, then run back and write the rest of the novel, but these are outliers. for the rest of us mere mortals, you must splash letters on the page, form words and shuck these words into nuggets of sentences. You must keep doing this until the magical Pegasus who got you through the first few parts of the book with such ease reappears and helps you once more. That Pegasus may not show his lazy ass until the next book, however. So if he doesn't, I recommend you learn to walk without him.
Yeah, that's what I am saying.
There's no secret formula. There is no method of advancing that will suddenly make the hard part disappear.
Personally I'm of the opinion that if you don't struggle at least at some point in the novel-writing process, you aren't challenging yourself. If the whole story was a breeze and you didn't have any moment of doubt or hardship to get the taunting cursor to obey your will to make a novel, then either you were incredibly inspired the whole time, you're just a super-naturally-talented-amazeballs-author. So it's normal to struggle, it is also normal to plod through until the Pegasus reappears. Often, until your next book, in which the Pegasus promises not to leave around the exact same spot, yet again.
For me, that's a sudden need for action and explosions. Men with guns, storm giants throwing boulders, orcs in the pantry.
For others, if you have plotted your novel down to the individual chapter and you are struggling, it is often worth introducing some big scene a little earlier than intended, or skipping to your next chapter, writing the fun bit and coming back to the missing chapter later (if you're able to write out of order like that) for a bigger, longer novel, I recommend creating and solving a smaller conflict in your 'boring' chapter.
When we're struggling with the tough bits, it is rarely the big important plot-reveals, especially in my experience, the struggle is in the small details I must include for the next big scene.
Anyway, I hope this advice helps next time you are struggling in the middle!
I'm actually shocked I've made it this long for blogging.
Anyway, recently I conducted a poll on twitter to find out which part people found the hardest for writing their manuscript. Unsurprisingly, it was overwhelmingly 'the middle.'
I know some folk struggle with the beginning and end, I certainly fall into the 'endings are tough' category and have a tendency to rush them as a result.
Why is the middle of a novel so hard?
Would it surprise you to learn that pantsers and plotters alike share this same problem? Those who are exploring their universe, those who know the next chapter down to a T, all share the same trouble around the middle-point of their novel.Whatever steam they had when they started the novel, it now runs out, or blocks up and words become a grind to produce. I hate to tell you this, but that problem never goes away. Your momentum may push you through a little past the middle but inevitably we all hit what athlete's call 'the wall.'
Your ability to push past that wall and finish is what seperates writers from authors, in my humble opinion. An author has finished a novel, a writer is in progress. I'm not dissing anyone on their first novel that is struggling through, nor am I saying that every single project must be finished. I recently looked at my litRPG novel of 40k progress and am considering dumping the whole hot mess. That's well over my usual halfway points.
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| image from google image search |
Writing a novel is hard work. If it were easy, as one great author once said, everyone would do it. People believe it is easier than it looks, certainly. Practice makes some parts easier, but the 'wall' is in every good exercise routine and every good novel.
So what is the wall? For me, around the middle, my brain starts throwing out doubts, my soul, once carried on a flood of optimism and joy, has now met with the cold, hard reality that I must keep typing in order to reach the next milestone. I am tired of the novel, I've put days or weeks into it, can't I move on to a shiny, new idea? My muse is maybe screaming about shiny new options and I am consuming media outside of the apetite that led down the funnel to entice this novel.
I start having days where I can only manage 200 words.
I might be busy, uninspired, unwell, stressed from other places, whatever the cause, I cannot write today.
The plodding centre has hit.
Other authors describe this as the moment when they must sweat to force the words on the page, wrangling them out one letter at a time, as is the only method of wrangling words, afterall.
It is hard because writing is exercise for the brain, and no good exercise should be a breeze with no exertion.
What is the secret?
When I was a youngling, fresh and starry eyed, I browsed a million different blogs and writing advice columns. I collected links and realms of knowledge in order to find the magic 'formula' or secret that would make writing suddenly easy and effortless. |
| image from google search |
I am afraid to say, there isn't a secret. Most writing is hard. The middle will be hard for most of us. Some people jump to the end and write that first, then run back and write the rest of the novel, but these are outliers. for the rest of us mere mortals, you must splash letters on the page, form words and shuck these words into nuggets of sentences. You must keep doing this until the magical Pegasus who got you through the first few parts of the book with such ease reappears and helps you once more. That Pegasus may not show his lazy ass until the next book, however. So if he doesn't, I recommend you learn to walk without him.
Yeah, that's what I am saying.
There's no secret formula. There is no method of advancing that will suddenly make the hard part disappear.
Personally I'm of the opinion that if you don't struggle at least at some point in the novel-writing process, you aren't challenging yourself. If the whole story was a breeze and you didn't have any moment of doubt or hardship to get the taunting cursor to obey your will to make a novel, then either you were incredibly inspired the whole time, you're just a super-naturally-talented-amazeballs-author. So it's normal to struggle, it is also normal to plod through until the Pegasus reappears. Often, until your next book, in which the Pegasus promises not to leave around the exact same spot, yet again.
What can I do to keep going?
In my case, as a 'light' plotter for the last few novels and primarily a pantser overall, if I am suddenly feeling dejected or even adrift from the novel, it is probably a sign I need to blow something up. One writing teacher introduced this concept with 'A man walks in with a gun.' but really it can be any additional 'a bomb explodes' or a family member gets cancer, or something thrilling, derailing and violent happening that forces us out of the comfort zone.For me, that's a sudden need for action and explosions. Men with guns, storm giants throwing boulders, orcs in the pantry.
For others, if you have plotted your novel down to the individual chapter and you are struggling, it is often worth introducing some big scene a little earlier than intended, or skipping to your next chapter, writing the fun bit and coming back to the missing chapter later (if you're able to write out of order like that) for a bigger, longer novel, I recommend creating and solving a smaller conflict in your 'boring' chapter.
When we're struggling with the tough bits, it is rarely the big important plot-reveals, especially in my experience, the struggle is in the small details I must include for the next big scene.
Anyway, I hope this advice helps next time you are struggling in the middle!
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