SEVERE writer's block.

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I have been stuck on this one novel (my first) for years now. I have too many ideas, no solid plot or characters, nothing written, and I am at the point that if I don't get ANYTHING written, I'll be a joke to everyone around me. They want me to lower my f*****g standards. They want me to write hackwork, send it out, snort some. f**k that. I want more than that, okay? This isn't some James Patterson book. This isn't some f*****g Fabio romance. All I want to write is an intelligent thriller, and I AM NOWHERE! YOU UNDERSTAND! NO-FUCKIN-WHERE!

Until you have a plot and characters, you won't be able to get anywhere. So you need to figure out how to get those things jump started. Much better than lowering your standards. (The world does not need another James Patterson book. There are too many of those already... Although, there is nothing wrong with fooling around with crappy drafts to see what works, as long as you perform major surgery as needed to whip them into shape later.)

My first suggestion, if you can afford it, is to look for some of Holly Lisle's books on writing. I think her Create A Character Clinic is still available. And How To Write Page Turning Scenes is a good one. I do not recommend her because she has "the Answer", but because she breaks down her process and explains it so that you can tweak it until it works for you.

I've got a few private tricks of my own, which might or might not be of any use at all to you, but I'm not very good at explaining them. I've figured out what works for me, and I do it. But if you can't afford Holly's books, or if they aren't enough help, I don't mind trying to see if I can help you work your way through it. Writers block is a horrible thing.

As for those waiting to see a finished book: ignore them. I know that can be hard, but you've got to write at your own pace, not let pressure get to you. And if "snort some" means what I presume it does, that's the worst possible idea. Drink and drugs may make you feel more creative, and there are certainly writers who have reached the point where they had learned to depend on such things to get any work done, but there is little doubt any of them would have been able to produce much better work with a clear mind. Feeling is not always reality, and growing so addicted to that feeling that you can't create without it is one of the few things that might be worse than writers block.

Screenplays are written backwards, that is, you already know the ending so every event builds towards that. Fiction is the same. The specific ideas about conflict and character arc can be developed later. At least, with an ending, you can design an outline and fill out the body of the book based off that.

You're assuming an outline works for every writer. In reality, some of us use outlines, some can't work with them, and some use different processes each time.

That said, I do agree that you've got to have at least a pretty good idea where the story's headed before you can write it. But I completely disagree that character is something you can go back and fill in later. Character and plot interact; different characters will not make the same choices, so you won't end up with the same plot if you use a different character.

Edited to add: My remarks are based on the premise the OP mentioned, that they would like to create a well-written book. Few screenplays would fit my definition of "well written", since most are so full of plot holes you could drive a fleet of trucks through them, characterisation is weak or non-existent, and so on. Yes, there are a few exceptions, although even the few movies and TV shows I can bear to watch wouldn't fare so well if transferred to the printed page, where you don't have all those cool visuals to dazzle the reader into overlooking the blemishes.

And it is not just screenplays. Martin Cruz Smith, who is far from being a hack, wrote at least one book with such a major, glaring flaw that I can't understand how it was ever published. (Stalin's Ghost: where in the beginning, a detective calls a woman pretending to be another detective - but later in the book, we discover this woman knew the detective she thought she was speaking to, and yet she never noticed a thing. Because Martin Cruz Smith never noticed he'd made that little slip. There's a blip in the subway scene, too, but that's relatively minor.)

Are you familiar with storyboarding? Design your characters and events almost like a flowchart... once you know the major events, you just need to flesh out the details. Fiction or non, it's nice to see/know the whole sequence of events in advance... games and movies are made this way.

You and the mass effect 3 team are NOT on the same page apparently.

Sadly..

Maybe this will help. It's the tvtropes So You Want To Write A Story Page:

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/S ... riteAStory

I'm not saying you don't know how to write a story but maybe the advice on this page will help you get over your writer's block. If you scroll down to the plots bit there is some good advice on how to make plots, ie:


One way to find plots is listening to people. In the bus, in the subway, in the wall before the dentist, in the restroom, everywhere people talk, and chit-chat, and lament. Everybody believes their lives could make a book, or at least a good chapter of a Soap Opera. Of course, this is not true, but from anecdotes from strangers the embryo of a good story can born. Even from family you can get inspiration; there is fountain of inspiration on familiar anecdotes. Many authors have met fame and fortune writing disguised versions of their family exploits.

Aside from picking up plots at random, you can start with an archetypal plot and go from there. Christopher Booker's The Seven Basic Plots outlines, well, seven archetypes, from The Quest to classic monster-slaying to Rags to Riches to Tragedy and even Rebirth (the Tragedy plus a Heel Face Turn in time for it to matter). There are others who classify the archetypal plots in different ways and with different numbers, from two (every story is about Love or Death) to 42 or even more.

Another tactic: Design your main character and center your story around what he or she does. Just remember: A plot happens when someone wants something badly and is having trouble getting it. If Bob, your hero, wants a job at a nearby Pizza Hut, make him really want it, and let us in on the reason he does. Maybe he's desperate for money. Maybe the girl of his dreams works there too. Maybe he needs a job, any job, before his great-uncle shows up and drags him off to something worse (or his parents send him to That Camp). But if he really doesn't care whether or not he gets the job, we're not going to care either. And if he just walks in and applies, and they accept him on the spot, then maybe the job turns out to be not all he dreamed of. Otherwise, if he gets his wishes immediately ... what was the story again?

Hope this helps.

Oh, that is so true! I've fallen so many times into the trap of intoxicating my mind in order to produce creative writing. Most of the time I ended up re-writing everything the next morning...

I may give some advice (but I'm aware that they may be useless):

There are usually two ways to write a novel: by creating a plot or by creating a scene. I'd say the the latter one usually produces more creative and interesting stories. Thus it may be better to plot the characters in your head instead of forcing yourself to create a plot.

A story usually starts simple. It begins with a scene and the writer describes what happens. This is a good start. Simply create a scene and see where it goes. You will eventually get to know your characters and you will begin to see where the plot is heading. A good novel is always based on the characters, not on the plot. If you read great novels you will see that the plot is usually quite dull, but the characters are memorable.

A good novel writes most of it by itself. The writer only needs to know how to built the sentences. (And that can be very difficult.)

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGmY96qhnBI[/youtube]

Or, you can start with the climax, the really neat part of the story, and then build both forward and back.

Depends on what kind of story you are writing. If you want a strong narrative story, then this concept may not work. Think about Lord of the Rings. It begins very slowly and that part is what I consider as its "hook". (Even though other people may not agree.) If it would begin with something dramatic, then the whole plot would be ruined.

But yes, this backward concept has often generated many great stories. If I remember correctly, Kallocain by Karin Boye uses a very strong opening sequence where the whole story has basically ended before it begins. I find that concept fascinating. (This forgotten and misunderstood novel may not be the best example but it was simply something that came into my mind when thinking of this.)

Basically, I'm trying to write a psychological sci-fi thriller about a girl who volunteers for her estranged father's human enhancement project, and stumbles upon an elaborate conspiracy. And I can barely put a sentence down.

If there's a psychological element to this story, then knowing your characters is even more essential. You'll have to get to know them before you can do anything else. And you'll have to understand the conspiracy and how it works, then get at least a rough idea of the plot. But you really need to understand the characters and the conspiracy (and, I assume, the human enhancement project as well). Essentially, you've got to do a decent bit of "world-building", even if your story is set in a near future world, then get to know the characters who live in that world. I recommend the world-building first, because the culture they live in will influence the characters. For example, I am not, in many ways, a modern person, but I am influenced by the world around me, even as I reject some aspects of it.

For the plot - and for issues of getting the story down - I still recommend Holly Lisle's How To Write Page Turning Scenes, unless you've already tried that and it failed to help. And her Create A Character Clinic is a nice start on characters, although I've developed my own "interview" for characters which helps me get to know them and goes much further than hers. (This is not the same as a "character checklist" which helps you keep track of mundane details about a character. The interview helps you get to know what makes them tick.)

Edited to add: I'm not sure if this is still available, but Holly Lisle also had a package on breaking through writer's block, and although it doesn't go easy on you, it's the best advice in that line I've ever found. That's why I recommend her writing books so highly, because she takes a different approach to all the "write a bestseller in six weeks" manuals, and she breaks down her process, and explains why she does the things she does, so even if you want to change it up, you understand more of what you're doing. Another thing that might help jump start you would be Lazette Gifford's Two Year Novel course (in two parts, year one and year two), which I think is back on sale. It is more structured than I like, but has some great ideas.

Another suggestion: go on over to Forward Motion and look around and talk to people there. (Forward Motion is a writers' community, started by Holly Lisle and now run by Lazette Gifford - and I stick around there because they tend to know their stuff.) One urgent point if you go there: they are not against aspies. Apart from Wrong Planet, this is the one place on the web where I feel most at home. But you do have to follow the TOS. They are there to keep things from getting ugly for anyone, and they are enforced. It isn't that hard to do; they aren't draconian. But you do need to know they are taken seriously, not like some sites, where people violate the TOS all the time and everyone winks about it. There are other aspies over there, including writers who, as far as I know, aren't on here, but I don't feel comfortable 'outing' them so I'll just say they exist.

I'm really sorry to hear that.

I understand completely. I've been stuck writing the same thing for 5 years now (then again I'm just a kid and I still have a lot to learn). And I have this problem where I have an idea, start something, then it disintegrates and I'm left with this thing that I don't know what to do with.

All I know is, it helps to read when you're not writing. Read, read, read, read everything. Constantly narrate things that are happening, whether out loud or in your head or on a scratch piece of paper. Even if it's the most mundane thing, narrate, and write down dialogue that happens, and create a backstory if you want.

When I come up with stories, I usually come up with a small concept first then build. If it's starting the story that's difficult, think about the first scene. What's happening in the scene from start to finish (for example, from the moment a character enters a building and leaves it). Then start in the middle (so the character is already in the building, and you're starting right before the climax of the scene, then the next scene starts form the beginning, and the order can change, it's all about cutting and editing). Most of what I know about writing has come from screenwriting experience, as I was required to write my own scripts for my short films in high school. In screenwriting, you're generally as concise as possible. You reveal only information that is necessary and dialogue that helps roll the story forward. Writing a novel is almost the same except it doesn't have to be written to be converted into a visual format.

I also suggest watching movies and thinking about how scenes play out, where scenes begin, and how the characters develop. What the character's problem is in the beginning, and how that problem changes or escalates, and then their priorities in the end. For setting, it seems other people have covered that in terms of advice.

Your concept sounds very intriguing and I wish you the best. Hopefully, in the future I may be able to read it?

On the first point - if you get stuck, stick the fragment away. Someday, you'll learn enough you can take it further. Although it is important, vital even, to learn to finish at least some of the stories you write. Finishing a story is not the same as starting one, part of what you learn by finishing is how to pull that disintegration together and make it work.

As for reading, you're right, of course. You cannot be a writer without reading a lot. And you can't be a writer without writing a lot, too. It takes many thousands of words on the page to learn to edit yourself, to write your way out of the messes you write yourself into (we all do that...), etc. (So far this year, I've got over 400,000 words down, and I'm pretty happy with a decent proportion of those. I'm not saying I won't have to do any edits, but I'm not tossing pages out in despair, either. )

Sweet Pea hugs