It's Amazing What a Little Bum Glue Can Do!

It's official!  Bum glue works!

In my most recent post, I lamented the lack of colour in my writing. Characters weren't talking to me, the scenery was drab, nothing sparkled.

I thought perhaps I needed to return to my writing gurus for inspiration - and that certainly is a good thing.

But - I held off, thinking that perhaps, my desire to poke my nose back into 'How To' books might just be another stalling tactic.

As an experiment, I decided to just stick it out, continue on with the bad writing, just let the crappy stuff flow and see what happened.

The results are in, and they are very interesting indeed.

It seems there is a direct relationship between the number of words one manages to choke onto the page (crappy, or not) and how good those words eventually begin to feel.

Over the course of the past few weeks of applying massive amounts of bum glue to my...well...bum...my writing has once again come to life.

Signy's voice has returned, as sharp and prickly as ever, as has those of the other main characters. The settings are bright and clear, the plot is taking on some unexpected twists and turns.

Conclusion?

When you begin to have self-doubts...

When you fear that even if you used a dagger as a quill, you couldn't write your way out of a paper bag...

When you know beyond a shadow of a doubt that you are scribbling drek that no one will ever read...

When you begin to contemplate a 9 to 5 office job?

Then it the time to apply a liberal slather of bum glue.

STICK TO IT...

Your next sentence just might be a masterpiece.

Where's the Colour?

Remember that old commercial? The one where the old lady opens her chain restaurant hamburger and asks in a gravelly voice, "Where's the beef?"

That's how I've been feeling lately, but instead of the beef I've been missing the colour.

I've been working on some new scenes for the second book. I had put the manuscript aside for awhile as I pondered some plot problems but I'm back on track now, comfortable enough with my new direction to have resumed churning out words to fill the empty spaces.

No. My problem now is a lack of COLOUR.

You know what I mean?

Characters that lie limp on the page like black and white stick people. Even my main cast seem lackluster. Signy is humdrum, Grace can't think of a thing to say and the complexTracker is about as dry as dry can be. He might as well be reading from the phone book.

And the extras? Those important little characters that fly in and out of scenes, not only as plot devices but also to add that hint of spice a scene sometimes requires? Even those guys and gals are leaving me cold.

My beats are repetitive and predictable - As a matter of fact, if you catch me writing, 'He scrubbed a hand over his balding pate'  or 'Barely suppressing a giggle' one more time, please shoot me.

And the settings? Humpf. That's where I'm really falling flat. Oh sure, I stick in the sights and the sounds and the smells and tastes but what churns out is like a reproduction of a bad reproduction. When I go back and try to fix what I've done, I only seem to make things worse. Kind of like that sad little painting of Jesus that elderly Italian woman tried to fix then and turned into a dreadful cartoon.

Okay. Enough complaining. Obviously, something is missing. It might have something to do with the phrase I used earlier in this post  - the bit where I said I was 'churning out words to fill the empty spaces'.

Sure, I'm in the process of pumping out words and sometimes, that is not a bad thing. Sometimes, it is just as important to keep the wheels greased, the story moving forward, the word count satisfied. I understand that.

But, I think there comes a time, when churning out words, while satisfying one's bum glue requirements, no longer feels good - especially when the product is so bland.

So, back to the basics I go. Yup - Time to revisit those two classic "How To" books that work for me.

Stephen King's "On Writing" and Elizabeth George's "Write Away."

Here's hoping that these tried and true writers will once again show me the way to that world of colour I have been so missing.

Help me remember how to turn this....












Into this....