Novel Spaces is in its 10th year! Over the coming months we'll be featuring some of the most popular posts from our archives. This one was first published November 28, 2011.
By Carol Ottley-Mitchell
Three children had fallen into the crater of a volcano and I had no way to help them get out.
To make matters worse, they were my children, or they had been for the last few weeks and four chapters of my WIP, the fourth book in the Caribbean Adventure Series.
I was as stuck as they were, unable to move the adventure forward. I was suffering from the much discussed writer's block. Finally, after staring at the page for many more days, (dare I say weeks?) than I care to mention, I remembered a bit of advice about overcoming a block. That writer suggested that one solution to writer's block was to rewrite the scene, come at it from a different angle.
So, I, very reluctantly, took the kids back the way they came out of the volcano and took a second shot. It worked. This time they found a solution to that issue and moved forward to the next.
What techniques do you use to kick start your writing if it stalls?
I also rewrite the scene to get into the right frame of mine. Often, what I've written doesn't work, but it's hard to let go of it. I'll hold on a bit too long, but once I redo it and it works, it's such a rush and I'm motivate to keep going. I enjoyed this post.
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