Do you accomplish your best work in the midst of chaos, or must you have peace? Can you write only when bothered by nothing, or does the need to escape worry propel you toward the keyboard? (Or the pen and paper, the notebook.)
Do you need a designated space, the perfect setting? Or do words fly off your fingertips in a crowded room, with children crawling at your feet and voices raised in supplication?
Do you organize everything before you begin or do you jump into the story or the article or the poem and let your thoughts tumble as they may?
Speak to me. I’m curious.
And once you do, I’ll respond.
I have to have peace and quiet. At home, that’s normally on the reclining loveseat with my feet propped up.
I can’t just jump in and start writing. I must have a general idea of where I’m going. Then I write the logline and a summary. Although I don’t outline as such, I tend to see how to fit my story into three acts and determine (a la James Scott Bell) the doorway to Acts 2 and 3. I typically write bullet points (not detailed) for major events in each of the acts.
For the novel I’m getting ready to start, I’m also letting Jeff Gerke’s new Plot vs. Character AND a nifty screenwriting book called Save the Cat influence my approach to getting started.
I wrote a short this morning because I got up with it on my mind. I don’t need a preferred place or time and can tune out distractions, but I am most productive when in my chair and there are no distractions going. I do have a study yet tend to work in my recliner (actually Roger it is a reclining loveseat as well) with my laptop on the airdesk beside it. I don’t outline but just let the story flow where it wants to go. My first chapters are normally disposable, just to get the story flowing and I know I will come back later and rewrite them once I know the story and am comfortable with the characters.
Our children are all grown up and on their own, so I took over our son’s room and converted it into my writing room. I’m easily distracted by voices and other noise. With my writing room, I can close the door and work. I always light a candle and place it next to my computer screen. I place props and pictures around that remind me of the characters or settings I’m writing about.
Once, while writing Forest of Fear, I caught a chipmunk, two days in a row, and kept him in a clear, plastic cage, filled with redwood chips, and placed it next to my computer. When writing Legend of the White Wolf, I decided it wouldn’t be such a great idea to have one of those in the room.
I play mood appropriate music for the scene I’m writing, but it can’t contain lyrics which, again, are distracting.
The title always comes first. Then I write as I go, however, before I start writing, I tell myself the basic story into a recorder and transcribe those notes. I never look at them again until I finish the first draft. These notes provide the main character, the setting, the main plot thrust, the basic beginning, middle and end, but not much else. I never read anything I’ve written until the first draft is completed either.
When one of my stories is set in a place I haven’t visited, or is about a subject where I don’t have much background, I research books in the library, Internet sites, and contact experts who often send me articles, books, and even videos.
My best writing time is in the evening, beginning at around 6 PM. I never start a book I won’t finish, or a chapter that I won’t complete in that sitting. I usually finish three chapters in a typical evening. When I’m finished for the night, I take a post-it-note and write, “Next,” at the top. Then I write what would happen next in the story if I were to have continued writing the next chapter.
I’ve never experienced writer’s block and enjoy everything about the writing process.
I most often write, as now, at a table in our master bedroom. Fire up the little fountain for ambiance, give the mouse a littel jiggle, then I listen to classic rock on the web. A bit schizophrenic on the amibiance side.
Since I’m a recovering Las Vegas contractor (tanslated; ‘unemployed’), I can write whenever I want. Right! Mornings work best for me, and I like to sit and write for over an hour. Like a train leaving the station, it takes a bit for the inspiration to kick in, so BITS is the name of the game. Having the door shut and distractions reduced helps tremendously.
Sometimes I will wake at 3 a.m. and inspiration will hit. If I think about it, I’lll probably go back to sleep, then forget it upon waking. Should I write the idea on a pad at my nightstand, I can write about it the next day. However, the best writing comes from hauling my keyster out of the sack and getting to it. The best things in life are hard, indeed.
I write during our home school day while my kids are working beside me and at night after they’ve gone to sleep. My husband and I often time our work so that we are free later in the evening to hang out and chat.
I plan to the gills with outlines and character threads and plot blocks…then I give myself permission to deviate from it all if I need to.
I also keep note cards on my nightstand because fixes and ideas tend to come to me right as I’m drifting off to sleep.
Edge of Your Seat Romance
When I am writing fiction, it doesn’t matter what is going on around me. The Lord pushes me to write and I do my best to obey. When I worked for someone else and had a pre-teen, 5 hours sleep a night was a luxury. Wouldn’t you know it, a story would wake me and I couldn’t go back to sleep until it was written.
With my non-fiction blog, I prefer quiet, of course the dogs snoring at my feet is considered quiet around here. I need to concentrate and convey (human)facts in a new and interesting way and I need to cross check and make sure it is an original idea and accurate.
My fiction comes from love. I do find it is a better read if I plan the story chapter by chapter. Since this is my gift to the reader it is important I make it the best read possible.
All of the above 🙂 Since I live in Alaska, but spend time in Kentucky with the grandkids (3 boys–ages 9,7,and 3) and in Michigan with a 3-year-old, I have little of the quiet time or organization I’d like. What I prefer, however, is at least a little peace and quiet (peripheral noise is fine, as that makes me feel a part of things). Alaska is best for that–no children up there yet–and I often find myself sitting in the car beside a stream in a park on the Air Force base. That usually gets me going and then I can go home and take the thoughts I came up with “in the wild” to transfer to the computer. I tend to be very organized and when I’m at my desk, I have to have things just so.
I write in our dining room where the old computer is set up. I prefer to be alone, the house and dog quiet. I’ve written when all are home with movies or TV on in the other room, but I’m easily distracted and it’s not ideal. I need the earphones that you use when shooting guns. ;p
Gotta have a picture, thought, or feel for a character before I get started. Then who knows where the story will go. Started a novel from a song, a reaction to an actor in a movie (The Famous One), and who knows where those characters lurk.
It depends on which kind of writing you’re referring to. I do my pre-writing, my idea creating, anywhere. But, for the but-in-chair-hands-on-keyboard writing, I need absolute quiet. So, once the kids all get on the bus, I have about seven hours to get in quality writing.
Of course I dream of writing on a secluded beach on Minnesota’s North Shore (Lake Superior). Now that would be ideal. 🙂
I usually prefer sitting on the end of my couch, using a pillow as a backrest against the arm and facing my living room window. Right now the scene is winter white with snow on the ground. In summer I see a leafy green tree and the flowers that adorn my balcony. My laptop rests on a lapdesk on my lap.
I do have a large screen in the corner office of my bedroom that the MacBook can plug into but I dislike being stuck in a corner like I’m on a time-out LOL.
Quiet is best for me. I used to write action scenes with movie soundtracks playing in the background. The problem was, it gave me a false sense of how good my writing really was. I found that when I read what I’d just written, it didn’t sound nearly as good as it did when the music was playing. So I write with it quiet, and work to make the writing make it’s own music.
I dream of writing in the perfect place–and sometimes have. I have an old pickup truck, and I love the idea of driving to some quiet spot with the laptop–but that doesn’t happen often. Most of my writing takes place at my desk or kicked back in a comfy chair with my legs up.
I almost always carry a pen and a small notebook in my back pocket for those times a thought hits me or I hear somebody say something that I’d like to use in my writing.
Often I try to work out some detail in my head while I’m driving. And plenty of times I wake up in the morning with an idea for whatever writing I’m working on.
I had a breakthrough thought once in the middle of the night. I grabbed a pen, a pad of paper, and scribbled away in the dark. The next morning I found the pen didn’t work at the angle I was writing–the pages were blank. So I rubbed the side of my pencil across the indentations, trying to figure out what I’d been so excited about the night before.
So the real writing generally happens in a quiet office at my desk, but many of the thoughts and elements come together almost anyplace.
Hey, Normandie!
I write in my office with the heater and the TV on!!! Sometimes I write at our home computer as well, but usually have the TV on in the other room, or am IMing with my daughter.
I can write in the quiet as well, but after years in Community Centers, I’m used to the humming of a gym, the front door constantly opening and closing, kids screaming, and regular interruptions. Guess I need that to concentrate!
This is so much fun. What a varied group we have here. I’ll wait until later, to see if anyone else pops in with a note, before I give you my methodology.
I get up at two every morning to write. The quiet and darkness help me get in the mood of my project. My desk and computer are beside my bed so I have to be careful not wake my husband. If he does wake he’ll usually turn on the TV (or the light) and my mood flies away.
While I write I always consume great amounts of food and tea and coffee, especially if I have a difficult part of the ms to work out. And there are times I go outside and just walk and walk.
I’m also on the road a lot (usually night driving) and that’s another good time to formulate ideas and conversations. It does become a might dangerous when I try to write them down though. I can never find the right buttons on my recorder!
Hey, Normandie!
Before I start in on my pathetic work habits, I want to tell you what a spectacular website you have here! And if you ever stop writing, which I truly hope you never do, pick up that camera and keep it close by forever. You have such a gift…
I used to have the most perfect office. But my daughter and her two children moved back home with us due to some medical issues and I turned it over to them to use in their home schooling. So, now I’m back to work in my bedroom just like I started out 30 years ago. It’s just fine, which just goes to show that you don’t need nearly as much ‘stuff’ as you think you do!
I do need quiet, though, so I do most of my wordsmithing’at night when everyone is asleep, and I do need my work area to be clean and uncluttered. But when I’m allowing a plot to ‘gestate’ or I’m stumped, I get in my car and just drive out in the country. That allows me to talk to God without any interruptions, and my mind seems to clear in the wide open spaces of Texas. I always keep a tape recorder with me, too, just in case…
Other than that, I try to live just like any other ‘normal’ person.
Ronni, what a lovely note. Thank you.