I am Legion

Now, where was I?

Ah, yes. I was saying that a book is organic, that it lives. And it does. Books often write themselves - not literally, of course, the writer is still the one who has to put pen to paper, or finger to key.

It varies from writer to writer, but it's still true. I like to plan my stories out before I get down to writing them. From past experiences, I've found that if I don't, I end up getting stuck or lost, the story falters and I put it to one side, forgotten as I move onto something more interesting. For a time, I actually wondered if I could ever finish a story. And that was where Liberator's Ruin came in. It was a test for me, to see if I actually had the patience to stick with a story from beginning to end. Three years later, I passed the test.

But it was the plan that helped. The backbone on which the rest of my story hung.

Despite using a plan, I still see writing as organic. I never adhere to the plan rigidly, it just informs the path of the story, gives me direction. But how the story builds, well, that happens when I put my hands on my keyboard and start writing.

What impetus causes that to happen, prey tell? Why, the characters, dear boy, the characters. They're almost living, breathing beings (albeit ones who live in my head), running around doing things. Sometimes they do things I didn't expect, and when that happens, it's breathtaking. And a little annoying. I'll have this whole routine planned, and what do they do? They bloody ignore it!

Yes, I know that makes me sound crazy - I once told someone that writing is a bit like having lots of different people in your head who seem very much alive, at which point she gave me a funny look and took several steps back, as if I'd suddenly grown a second head.

Hey, what can you do? At least I'll never get lonely.

The Great Obstruction

I have writer's block.

And I say that like I have a disease or something. Except it's one that builds up a great big bloody wall in my head. On one side, there's my creativity, my ability to cohesively string words together into some sort of descriptive piece, crafting stories with deft flicks of a keystroke. And on the other side there's me, seeing this blank wall stretching in either direction for as far as the eye can see. Too long to go around, too high to climb over.

And of course, these things never suddenly appear. They creep up on you, built brick by brick by an army of gnomes. You can't tell it's happening at first. It starts to take longer to write a scene, as the wall's foundations are laid. Then, as the wall gets higher, and it starts to trip you, it gets harder to find the write words with which to begin, until, finally, you're sat there, hands poised over the keyboard, ready to begin, but nothing comes. You know what you want to write, but the words just aren't there. It's been thirty minutes, and still nothing. And when you finally look up, you see the wall, staring at you.


The most terrifying thing about writers block is that it feels like you're never going to write again. I know it's false, that eventually the wall will go, and I'll write again.

I just need a bit of time to let the foundations crumble, and I can smack that wall with a bloody wrecking ball.

Well, at least my knack for hyperbole hasn't left me!