Only last month in my March Round Up I was writing how spring has arrived, flowers are in bloom and everything was looking hopeful. Now in Norfolk the wind bites into me whenever I’m out walking the dog, my washing keeps getting soaked and any hint of sunshine and warmth is fleeting… which is why this month’s blog post is about reluctance.
It's been a quiet month. Most of my recently accepted
stories come out later in the year. I’ve been focused on other writing projects alongside going on social media to advertise the release of my highlander
romance, The Redcoat’s Honour.
Writing News ?
Perhaps the wet weather did help with getting me in the
right mindset for a personal goal I wanted to tick off. As mentioned
previously, there’s a Christmas story where I kept on missing my self-imposed
deadlines. I finally sat down and forced myself to finish no matter the season, with carols blaring into my headphones. It was sent off a few weeks ago and accepted!
😊 When I hear which
issue it will appear in, I’ll let you know.
This is a scene that will be edited a dozen times after
this. It might not even survive the final version, but I hope its essence remains as this was the very first scene I imagined when plotting out this mystery novella. The
tentative title is The Copper Rose Heir.
🏶
There was another
shadow behind Poppy. This one moved. It was the height of a man and staggered
at times, slowed down by the sucking marshes.
With this flat
landscape, there was nowhere to hide. Her only choice was to run.
A hand of mud
wrapped around Poppy’s ankle, her teeth jabbing into her tongue as she sprawled
and lost her boot. Mud squelched between her fingers, tears coated her eyes,
but her cry was silent. She laid further out in the muck, peeking beneath her
fringe to watch the stranger’s approach.
The man went still,
uncertain where she’d gone. Poppy’s nails dug into clumpy lumps of grass as his
head turned this way and that. Held her breath and prayed as all frightened
animals did that their hunter did not look down.
Something scuttled
over her fingers. Water seeped into the front of her dress.
One of the distant
scarecrow-like shadows stretched a pair of wings, head tilting back, beak
opening. The cry was frenzied, a bird call Poppy had never heard before, and
the hairs on the back of her neck went up.
Even the stranger
hissed in surprise. All the other birds were joining in, flapping furiously.
Inspiration is what fuels us as writers, but it can be a
tricky creature to cajole. Now, I don’t believe in writer’s block entirely, but
rather writer’s reluctance. That feeling of being unable to start/renew a
project because of doubt (it’s no good), exhaustion (I’ll work on it
later) or too much to do (what if this other project will prove more
successful or that one will?) ß This last one gets me every time.
It’s an even more frustrating struggle when this is your
main job. There’s no cure. Often any progress involves writing so many words a
day and hoping it will look better come morning. For me, I try to hold on
to the fact that I love writing and, even when I feel at my lowest, I just have
to unearth that emotion when it becomes buried by everything else.
Everything around us, movies we can't stop talking about, video games that suck
us in, music we play again and again, books that we’ll never let go, all of
them were made with that frantic mix of love and the need to pay the bills. We're not alone even if it can feel as if we're calling into the void, especially when drumming up interest on social media.
What’s the one thing about writing
that gives you a rush? Is it editing and chopping to hit that word count?
Research?
For me, it’s having that first image of a story and then
linking more and more scenes together. Whenever I have a spare minute, I go
through history magazines, cookbooks, to inspire snapshot scenes for a story.
Even though it might have nothing to do with what I’m currently writing, it
keeps my interest fizzing and I’ll have plenty of ideas to dip into when I do move
onto the next project
.
.
.
although my to do list is now a mountain :P
See you all next month, where I’ll be sharing ideas for
social media that isn’t just waving a banner saying you’ve published something.
Kitty-Lydia Dye wanders the beaches for inspiration with her dog Bramble. Her historical fiction has been influenced by the local myths roaming the haunting landscape of the Norfolk marshes. Many of her short stories have appeared in The People's Friend magazine. She has also released a collection inspired by Gaston Leroux's The Phantom of the Opera. She enjoys knitting dog jumpers, gazing at the waves at night, exploring church ruins as well as taking part in amateur dramatics (and played the part of an evil flying monkey!)
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