The occasional mental kick

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Over on his blog, Neil Gaiman's trying to play a wee practical joke on Penn & Teller fan, m'self.

I was going to write a little bit about 'quiet listening' as a part of the writing process. Then I realized Stephen King said it better here.

Yes, I'm finally getting comfortable with the link-thingy. First it was the Bronze Age, then everyone was going over to iron. Now I have to learn hyperlinks...

The book's trundling along. It's all about the subplots at the moment. I'm getting a clearer and clearer image of where the book ends up, so now the challenge is getting it where it's going. Mostly I listen. Sometimes I have to prod myself a bit.

Last night, I couldn't think of how the next scene would shape up. Mostly I'll go into a scene with a sense of the characters involved, the conflict/tension between them, or at least their different goals so I can found out how that shapes the conflict, but last night I just couldn't see it. I had an odd picture in my head and one sentence.

One mental kick in the ass later, I wrote that sentence. Then the next. And the one after that.

1200 words (I'm saving the extra 200 as a safety cushion in case I need it today) and four lean scenes later, I could have written heaps more. Stupid sleep...