A while back, when writing about writer’s block, I smugly said: “I honestly can’t remember ever having it.” I should have known that would come back to bite me.

Because after Christmas, I came to a period of blank “uh…what do I do now?”

Unfortunately, my own writer’s block remedy­—to notch up the pre-writing planning—seemed to have been the cause.

For I had planned. And I had planned. And sure, there could always be more planning…but I had planned. My head was crammed with so many intertwined, fantastic thoughts that my brain couldn’t compute where to go next. It was a traffic jam of ideas.

So between the planning and the doing, for a few days I got stuck.

I think the major essence was that I had a relatively whole, exciting vision of the completed novel—and therefore making it happen was far too unfathomable. How could I possibly use words on paper to create such incredible wow?

Of course, the answer is that in the first draft, you don’t. First drafts aren’t meant to wow. The initial stab won’t include all the suspense, all the nuances, all the foreshadowing, all the depth of character. Those come with the layering that comes with the subsequent drafts.

So once I agreed yeah, this’ll be crap, I was able to move on. My first draft now has over 10,000 words. They may not be lovely words. They certainly aren’t wow. But I’ll work on that later.

How do you get through the first draft?

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