Writerly Ways

[cornerofmadness]

Has anyone else suffered through what I’ve been calling “the flare?” You get a great new story idea. The characters are jumping up and down in your brain, scenes are flowing. It crowds out whatever you’re currently working on. Then, just as fast as it appeared, it goes away. I’ve been dealing with this a lot since the end of Nano.

I’ve got any number of story ideas in my head in the last few weeks and I’ll be all ready to write it and then it’s gone. It’s frakking frustrating. I’m wondering how to handle it. Granted, some stories are never meant to be. I have any number of half dead novels roaming around and have done since the 80’s. The sad part is I know that most of them are viable if I could only hold onto the idea.

I tried typing them into a file folder but that really didn’t seem to do it. I’m considering committing the ideas to digital recording, figuring I could explain it in detail much faster that way then if I sat down to type it out.

Case in point – The NY steam punk. I was raring to go. Got the characters. Got the first scene started. Totally forgot where I wanted it to go from here (let’s face it, I’m not sure how in the hell the two guys are really going to get together in 1880’s NY. It would have been so much more repressive.) Had an idea for a YA gay fantasy novel, have the beginning and end absolutely blaring in my mind and now, nothing.

I’m not sure how to get these ideas more fixed in my mind (or not even rise up to tempt me but that is a lesser wish. I wouldn’t want the muse to go quiet).

So does this happen to you? How do you deal with it?

I’m not even putting up the word counts because I am FAILING to do anything. I forced myself to edit my novel a little (okay a lot but still, not nearly as much as I should). Granted Big Bang is eating up time but that is almost over with. I’ll have no excuses after that.

Comments

[raceulfson.livejournal.com]

What I do when that happens is pitch a baby fit and sulk, so my advice probably isn't the best.

I have found if I can do something mindless (like play solitare or wash dishes) for a while I can usually get it back.

What is really frustrating is when lightening strikes and you are someplace you simply cannot write, like work. I try to scribble notes to keep the ideas with me, but that doesn't always work. I had the awesome idea for how to resolve a lil plot corner I'd written myself into, made a note, and moved on. When I got home I could not remember my idea at all. My note? It had one word :"Twang!".

It's been years now and I never have figured how what the hell I was thinking.

[silvrethorn.livejournal.com]

I usually have the opposite problem--I don't get that many ideas, and once one comes, it will not go away. I haven't worked on Ever Summer in almost three years, but it offered up the big, climactic scene just the other day. I dutifully wrote the scene down in the Big Purple Notebook and put it aside for future reference. Maybe being single-minded is a dirt-sign attribute, and deluges of new and shiny ideas is a Gemini thing. It's as good an explanation as any.

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

well I have to admit, I already have the pitch and fit sulk down pat.

Twang. Ha. I know. It usually happens to me on long car drives. I started carrying a recorder and no ideas came. I put the recorder away and boom there they were.

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't know what to do with just one idea at a time really.

Well Gemini is an air sign, so yes just as good an excuse as any

[sholio]

This happens to me quite a bit, although with me it's usually only when an idea is very unformed that I lose it completely. As long as I take detailed notes, I will often wander back to an idea that's been abandoned. I have SO many projects started right now, though, in stages ranging from a few rough notes to having a bunch of it written to knowing exactly how it ends but not being able to muster the enthusiasm to go ahead and write it. I wish there was some way to harness the wild-horse nature of my creativity and make it travel in the direction I want it to.

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

that's what I end up doing too. That's why I think the digital recorder would be better for me, quicker to make those notes.

[makd.livejournal.com]

I get the. "Do this paper/ research" flare. (Sigh.)

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

I get a little of that but mostly my issues there is either a) dammit requires human trials or b) OMFG why do I keep picking the things with biochemistry as its root