For me, the early stage of writing a book tends to be the most difficult. The story I see and feel in my head is not what’s getting down on paper and, despite the fact that I know better, I continue to be stubborn about the direction to go. And every time I go through this I think about the story I read about celebrated mystery writer Rex Stout, who, this story went, would sit down at his typewriter and write his story and keep going until he was done. One version, no revisions necessary. Done. And what about Michael Moorcock whose book on the subject of writing seemed, to me, to be so blithe about the difficulties– I know I came away with the impression that he didn’t feel writing was difficult at all. Whenever he felt stuck, he put his characters under attack. Not plot moppets but plot attacks!
I’m at that dangerous place in my story where I always think about giving up and writing something else… That shinier story that has the advantage of not having 15 chapters of awful.
Inspiration!
But then I’ll see something inspiring, like the dress pictured in this blog post: I found that, by the way, from a tweet by Candice Hern. If you’re not following her on twitter, you should be.
Go look at that dress.
It’s just gorgeous. Now I want to write a scene where my heroine is wearing a gown like that. How, how I ask you, could a hero NOT fall in love with a woman wearing a dress like that? Imagine how it would look in candlelight. :::sigh:::
Step Away From the Keyboard, Ma’am
This is why I should never be allowed near the internet:
First, I thought, WAIT! PINTEREST! I can pin that beautiful gold gown! So I go to pinterest and wonder, when I get there, why there are so many pictures of Arjun Rampal and then I got distracted (safe for work except, well, if anyone sees you it will be obvious you’re not working….) Really: I have 4 boards (5 now) and the only ones with more than one pin are my books and Arjun Rampal.
Anyway, I managed to create a board to pin the gold gown and THEN I ended up at this website Regency Society of America with its posting section on fabrics and then Esty where I looked at gorgeous pictures of Regency-style wedding gowns AND THIS website, Reproduction Fabrics.
So right. I better end this post here.
Who’s on Pinterest? Leave your pinterest info in the comments so I can follow your stuff.
Oooooh, that is a gorgeous dress! Everyone go look, please.
I am not on Pinterest because I have so many distractions already. I’m afraid I’d never get back out!
I would wear a dress like that. I really would
At least you can call (most of) those digressions “research”!
Judging by the various authors’ blogs I read, I would say that you are in the overwhelming majority in finding you get to a point where you just want to stop and move to something new. I’m always rather sceptical about those writers who apparently just wrote straight through with no problems.
Well, yes. It’s the dark side of research!
Haha! I enjoyed your Pinterest board of Arjun Rampal! I love Pinterest and have spent many happy hours there! My latest infatuation, David Gandy, is pinned all over my Man Board. I have also expanded to a board on real heroes, as well as a Beastie Boys board!
We must become Pinterest followers: http://pinterest.com/gjillianstone/
followed! You have some really lovely boards.