I’m delighted to welcome my guest today crime writer Eden Sharp who is busy working on Get 9 and Zero Day, Books 2 and Books 3 of her Vigilante Investigator Justice Series. Over to you, Eden.
I started off by telling myself I’d write on certain days. In a spare moment, I’d plotted out my bill-paying work and other commitments on a calendar and on the free days I’d set myself a word count goal. Adding everything up, it looked like I’d have a new novel written in no time. Except, life’s not like that. Those so-called ‘free’ days were taken up by matters I’d not had time to attend to during the hours I was actually at my job, or by chores, or by spending time with loved ones and friends. Quite simply, life got in the way.
It’s tempting to try and put aside great swathes of time to write but often I found I didn’t have that luxury of uninterrupted me time to really immerse myself in a fantasy world of my own making. I’d beat myself up about it. And then I came to the realisation that there was no point in giving myself a hard time about not having written, that I just needed to write something regularly and in my, albeit short, free moments I would focus on getting some words down. So here is my more productive plan for writing that next novel:
• Identify your down time. I travel for half an hour each way to my place of work on three days per week. That’s three hours where otherwise I’d be sitting staring into space. Even fifteen minutes a day is fine.
• Go to sleep daydreaming about your story. Not only are you in a more intuitive frame of mind, you will find you often dream about really good ideas.
• Every time you boil the kettle or brush your teeth or wash up, work on an idea for a scene in your head.
• When you watch TV, go to the cinema or read a book, imagine your character in a similar situation and decide how they would react. Then jot down the key points as a list. I find it easiest to do on my phone as it’s there wherever I am.
• If you feel you waste too much time on Facebook but can’t give it up, use it to ‘bookmark’ ideas for stories you might write.
• Take your protagonist everywhere you go. Imagine how they would react to the events of your day. This will reveal much about their character and allow you to really get to know them.
• By always asking what your character would do next, you’ll have a plot.
• Don’t beat yourself up if you feel the need to take some time out for yourself, even if that means doing nothing. Self-care is important and will make you more productive in the end, and joyful!
• Just three hundred words per day will equate to a novel by the end of the year.
• The simple truth is, little and often really adds up.
You can find The Breaks, Eden’s first novel in the Vigilante Investigator Justice Series here:
Where Do You Write?
If you’d like to promote your book by sharing your writing routine, where and how you write, give me a shout. How I Write is a new series on my blog. I’m fascinated at the way those with busy lives manage to carve out their writing time. I’m particularly interested in what helps you, as well as what gets in the way of your writing life.