writing updates, 10/24/2013

Long story short: I have two novel manuscripts completed. One of them is 113,000 words, and the other (which I did for NaNoWriMo last year) is about 52,000. I wrote three or four new short stories over the summer and submitted them to places like 3LBE and Space Squid, but had no luck. Nothing's new on the nonfiction front.

Short story long: I've hit a snag. Specifically with Novel #3, the second book of my science fiction magnum opus.

It's just not fun anymore.

Don't get me wrong; writing itself is still fun. I'm not renouncing the path of the writer, nor the literary world and all the glory and wonder and pain that's in it. Nope; I just mean to say that writing this book isn't fun anymore. I feel more like I'm beating a dead horse than channeling Calliope or Clio. 

I don't know what happened. Maybe I ran out of steam. Perhaps this happens to all writers in the middle of longish works: you bang out a beginning and you know where the end is, but after all those hours of writing and tweaking and fiddling, things turn sour. You wind up becalmed right around Chapter 15.

It's just become a slog. The words don't come. When they do, they're sluggish, dull, drab, and uninspired. I've never felt more like a hack than I have this past month. There isn't a scrap of meaning (or the second best thing, humor) in my writing anywhere.

That's the crux of the matter, right there: I meant for this to be a serious and thrilling adventure tale filled with witty dialogue and sizzling prose, but the latter two haven't materialized. You'd think if I couldn't make the story harrowing and swashbuckling, I could at least make it amusing to read. Even that seems beyond me these days. Every day (well, every three or four days, whenever I'm able to bite back the ennui long enough to open up Microsoft Word) I turn on my computer and stare down what I've written. The reality of its uninventive heavy-handedness is impossible to escape. Rather like a runaway piano.

It's not writer's block. I know where I'm going and what I'm (supposed to be) doing. I just can't do it. The spark's not there. It's supposed to be fun, but it's not. And if it's not a kick for me, I can tell it won't be for the reader. I'm bored stiff by this crap.

So what I want to ask my fellow writers and bloggers is: how do you deal with this sort of thing? How do you escape the doldrums? Where do you find the cool, refreshing zephyr of inspiration to fill your sails and push you to the white shores and the fair green country beyond? How do you bully your brain cells into dancing a mazurka with the English language, instead of stepping all over its toes? How do you coerce one or two of the Muses into sashaying down from on high and cutting the rug on your writing-desk? How do you get those dang juices flowing again?

Creative juices, you pervert.