UWA #1: Creativity

UWA stands for Unsolicited Writing Advice. I do not have a formal education in fiction writing and I am not qualified to be giving career advice to novices. Take everything I say with a big fat grain of salt. That said, today we’re going to talk about…

… Writer’s Block

If you’re a part of any sort of writing circle or if you have creative friends, you’ve been told that either writer’s block is a scourge or that it doesn’t exist at all. Obviously, your personal experience is yours alone, so it’s going to be different than anyone else’s. Some people will frequently run into creative blocks. Other people, like Stephen King, can write and write and write without really running into trouble. (He could totally be lying; it’s not like I could prove it if I wanted to.)

For me, creative blocks are very real, and I run into them pretty frequently. Now, there are any number of things you could do to stave it off. You could drink a cold glass of water and go for a walk just to clear your head. You could re-read everything you’ve written to see it all in context. You could take a long break from the manuscript and come back to it later with a new perspective. And all of these are good things to do! If you’re like me, though, you could keep the damn file open and just go read someone else’s book.

Yeah, that’s my advice. It’s my belief that reading and writing are two sides of the same coin; you cannot have one without the other. You can’t even perceive one without the other. Now, I write science fiction and fantasy, and I like to focus on the individual human experience. So, when I want to bolster my character interactions, I go read a book that does that really well. My go-to for this would probably be The Expanse series, which is frequently praised for its realistic space travel physics, but I think the real strength here are the relationships between the crewmembers of the Rocinante.

If I want to get really into worldbuilding, I’ll pick up something by J.R.R. Tolkien or (if you want to get contemporary) Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan. Every writer has their strengths, and if you want to work on an aspect of your writing, you should go ahead and take a hint from an author you admire. After all…

… Art Is Theft

My solution to working past a case of writer’s block is to just start stealing shit. Or “borrow” if you want to be polite about it. In the same way that every movie has already been made, your book is not original. Sorry, but there is no hope of creating a book that is completely new in every way. Everything in your story is regurgitated tropes and stereotypes that you’ve dressed up so it looks fresh, but none of it is new. Once you’ve come to terms with this fact, you can start getting good at committing creative theft.

Creative theft is like exercise. You should do it often, do it enthusiastically, and do it with someone you love.

And the nice part about stealing from other authors is that it’s creatively engaging. The idea of taking something that’s been done before and reshaping it to fit your story is exciting! So lean into that. Take something that you know already works, and then make it your own. This works for me. Might not work for you. But since you’re already here, why not try it out? One thing that you should be doing regardless is…

… Taking Notes

Picture this: you’re sitting at your desk, you’ve got your manuscript open in front of you, and you’re thirteen paragraphs into a new chapter. A character just hinted at a future plot development and you’re super excited to get there. Right when you’re about to put pen to paper, you realize that you couldn’t give less of a shit about what happens between now and then.

Now you’re looking at your phone. You’re checking your messages and looking and memes, since now this is more interesting than the project that you should be working on. Then you remember that you should be working on it. And now it’s no longer an emotionally engaging story. Now it’s a chore. You’ve just figuratively run face-first into a brick wall called Writer’s Block.

(Side note: cell phones are bad for the creative process. Get used to turning it off and focusing on the task at hand. It makes everything easier.)

When I’m writing, I take a lot of notes. I keep these notes on a physical notepad and sometimes, when I’m on the move, I’ll type something into the Notes app on my phone and come back to it later. But it’s important to keep notes on your own work and reference them frequently. Not only will it keep you engaged in the details, it’s also good for tricking your monkey brain into focusing on the project.

Our monkey brains love finding little nuggets of information. It’s why we play trivia games. It’s why we love that little sidebar in magazines where you can read bullet points about your favorite athlete. It’s why you read the list of ingredients on the shampoo bottle when you’re on the toilet but you forgot to bring your phone with you. Even if the stuff you’re reading is completely useless information, your brain still eats it right up.

Turns out, you can use this to your benefit. Make a habit of reading through your notes. Write down character quirks, plot devices, fun facts, and anything else that might pique your interest. In the same way that you know how to bribe a child with snacks, bribe yourself with your own bathroom reading. Before you know it, you’ll be so engrossed in your own note-taking that it’ll be easy to put it on the page. If you get used to “living” the fictional world you’re creating, making a book out of it will become second nature. Note-taking will get you into a creative headspace, so you can work on your…

… Emotional Engagement

Creative writing is not a science. Nonfiction writing can be. But if you’re setting out to create a fictional world and characters who live in it, you can’t fool yourself into believing that there is some perfect formula to it. There isn’t. The secret to writing a convincing story is to imbue it with emotion.

Since I don’t want to start yelling about how important it is, I’ll just say it plainly. If your characters don’t have emotional reactions and responses to the things happening around them, neither will your reader. Start by challenging your characters and then studying how they might react in a given situation. A stress-free, conflict-free plot will not challenge your characters. They won’t change or grow or even regress. And if your characters aren’t changing in a meaningful way, how can you expect your reader to give a shit?

(Source: my first few stories didn’t really challenge my protagonist. Turns out there’s nothing interesting about a badass child hero who doesn’t have any emotional weight to give his decisions context. Huh.)

Again, this can tie into my whole “art is theft” spiel. You can go through other books and find out how that author wrote about emotional hardship. It’s worthwhile to examine human responses to trauma. After all, when you challenge your characters, you’re also revealing their true selves, and from there you can develop them into a better, more interesting version of the person they were when the story begins.

Draw on your own life experiences. Did you lose a loved one? How did that affect you? How did you react? More importantly, (sorry) how would your beloved comic relief character react if they lost someone they cared about? Would they mask the pain with jokes, or would they break down completely?

Emotional engagement on the part of you and your characters is what keeps your story interesting, not only for the reader but also for you! Not to say that every second of your story should be emotionally arduous, but you should feel what your characters are feeling. They should run into obstacles and be forced to make difficult decisions.

The sum of my advice in today’s segment of UWA is this: do everything you can to insert yourself into your story as an active player. Feel the emotions you’re imposing on your characters. Take lots of notes and reference them frequently. Steal liberally from your favorite authors.

After all, how else can you write a rich story without fully immersing yourself in it?