Stalled.
May 13th, 2008 at 12:52 pm (Writing)
There’s a reason I work with detailed outlines: without one, my work rarely goes anywhere.
When it comes to short fiction, all I need is maybe a paragraph to work out how the story begins and ends, but novels need careful planning. Sometimes I say to myself, “Hey, I’ll just start writing and see where it takes me!” Occasionally I can crank out a couple thousand words like that, but eventually I get lost and the whole thing sputters to a halt.
More often I’ll write a paragraph or two and realize that the initial image that seized me needs more time to percolate before it can develop into a fully fledged novel or even a short story. Case in point:
Aaron Ellis was twenty-three in 1957. He drove an old Ford pickup painted red but gone to rust. Though he owned a four-year-old chestnut mare, Aaron left her in New Braunfels while he looked for work in the drylands of West Texas. He hoped to bring Molly out once he landed a steady job, or at least a decent paycheck, but for now it was wait and see.
There’s a story in that paragraph, and a rangy, literary kind of novel that dwells in the rugged landscape of Texas for which I have so much love. Unfortunately until I spend some time really concentrating on where Aaron’s headed, this is as far as he goes, stalled out in that battered Ford and waiting for his story to be told.
