Post by Lisa on Jan 3, 2010 14:58:31 GMT 10
Breaking the Block
by Lisa
Breaking the Block
Tamora Pierce herself is someone who has dealt with writers’ block, at one time being unable to write fictional pieces for a three-year span. Naturally, she has a lot of advice for people who suffer from being blocked.
One of the ways to circumvent a block is to introduce a new character who is bold and different from the rest. This gives something fresh for you to think about. Another way to shake things up is adding something dramatic – an accident, a storm, an elopement. Perhaps the tale can be rewritten from another character’s perspective, or in another tense.
Pierce also suggests putting the story on the back burner – work on another project (or several projects) and perhaps when you come back to the original story, the concept will seem fresh and you’ll have a new starting point. If not, you can always discuss it with friends and fellow-writers to see if they have ideas to get it back on track.
If none of these ideas work, Pierce suggests a mercy kill – sometimes it’s better to throw the concept away. It might be a plot-bunny you can give up for adoption; someone else might be able to work wonders with your idea. Or you can save it – scrap everything you’ve written, but save some notes so that one day you can come back to it. If the idea’s a good one, you might be able to do better justice when you rewrite it months (or years!) later.
Mercy killings are interesting. 
Maybe once we'd have seen it during Smackdown!