Gutting a Story But For a Good Reason

I think I need to completely trash a story, but it should be alright.  I'm only about 3 pages in, and I think I found a better direction to use anyway.  It was starting to sort of stall on me, and I think if I change it up a little, it might flow better.  And hurray and hurrah, I'm making some progress on my little mystery too.  I think in another week or two, I'm going to have something that'll make sense and something I can work with.  Tonight I've been trying to get a rhythm going, and I'm actually having a halfway decent time of it.  I've been trying to visualize the story before I type, which has been helpful, but I could probably stand to make sure I do a better job of relating the imagery to the reader.  That's a little problem I've need to do a more thorough job of. 

I've been trying to tiptoe through my stories a bit at this point, and make sure things are going right, but its just taking a while, and it doesn't help, I'm being goofy on Twitter, or watching Rambo movies and stuff.  Ah well, can't always be creating literary masterpieces all the time, now can I? 

Break Time

I've gone back to trying to squeeze a day off from writing once or twice a week again.  It lets me recharge a bit, and then I feel like I have to catch up, so I work harder when I pick it back up again.  Its good motivation I think.  I'm done to about 5 projects left, and then I'm done.  I think.  I don't really get time off too much so its nice to kind of sit around and do absolutely nothing.  There's been some nice progress as of late, since I'm not all wound up, trying to finish in a hurry, and stuff.  I'm sort of a third of the way through trying to figure out a plot for my mystery story.  I've turned a corner of sorts with it, and hopefully I'll have an idea how to finish it soon.  I just realized in the last couple of days or so, that writing a mystery in modern times is a little diffcult because of all the forensic science and CSI-type stuff that's available now.  That won't always work in a mystery story, if you're trying to rely on sleuth's brain to figure out something.  Investigators don't have crime labs in their heads, so I think part of my problem is trying to tell a story, that might be able to fit in the 1950's, or the 1890's or some era where computers and the internet don't exist.  I want to be able to have it be something I could figure, or the reader could figure out.  Since its a short story, I don't want to delve into forensic too much, especially since I don't know anything about that kind of science anyway.  But for what its worth I am now a mystery writer, which is kind of cool, and yes I will be using that as a pickup line at some point.

I Had A Schedule

Well...since things aren't going as quickly as I'd hope.  I now have no idea when this book will get published.  And surprisingly what should have been a low moment, ended up being a good one.  Since I don't have any time constraints, I lost some of the pressure of trying to finish things, and I'm starting to get fill in some plot details I wish missing, because I wasn't stressing out anymore.  I got about 5 pages done I might not have otherwise, and I'm optimistic that things will move forward now.  I'm still working out a few things obviously, but now I can take my time and do it right.  Hurrah.

Stuck

I had a lousy day.  Spent four or five hours trying to fix something that didn't need fixing, and was on 5 different freeways, that ended up being a complete waste of time.  And now I'm trying to figure out if I want to read about puzzles, because I'm completely bored, and have no life.  I'm just trying to figure out what sort of puzzle to use in my writing.  On top of that I think I've managed to come up with a character that suits me for my mystery.  Finally.  I thought I would be farther along on all this by now, but things have gotten freakishly slow, after my initial start.  I'm not sure what my problem is.  I've been trying to keep at it, but its gotten horribly slow the last couple of weeks.  I have a sneaky suspicion I've been distracted, but in a good way.  I suppose I can try to relax a bit, and maybe read or something.  I am just really restless as of late, and can't seem to get anything good on paper.  At some point this will all fit together the right way, I just have no idea how yet.

Oooo! Methinks Something Good is Happening

I might be able to put in an extra story in the book.  I think I'm up to 6 or 7 stories now, with a few pieces here and there like poetry, and some letters, I wanted to include.  I might be able to push this up to around 100 pages.  That's a little better, since I think readers will be able to get more for their buck with that, and I can feel better about getting more done.  I'm still trying to figure out if I'm going to keep writing after this.  I want to make sure I get everything I can down and not have any regrets about leaving something out.  I've been trying to see if I've got any more ideas for books, but the best I can think of is history book, and even that sounds too arduous to undertake.  I can't really think of much of anything past that. I might be ok being a one hit wonder, if it actually ends being that.   

On My Way

I feel like I'm really devloping some characters for a change, as opposed to just writing dialogue for robots to say to each other.  I'm really trying to give some thought behind some of these things for a change.  Its kind of fun, because I seem to be injecting myself a little more into the stories, and the people in them.  I think it helps to do that, because it makes you care about the characters, because in some way, you're looking out for yourself too.  At any rate, I think its improving my writing, and I think I can get some story from having people involvment as opposed to character involvement.  Ok.  That's it.  Back to work.

Mystery Solved....A Little Bit Anyway

I think I'm on to something finally with this mystery story.  Finally.  I got a few ideas to toss around.  At least ones that didn't seem so bad.  Part of my problem has been worrying too much about how much about it, instead of it just come naturally to me.  I have some real good places to start now, so it should be a little easier to put a plot together.  I'm fairly sure I've got some good angles to work with for a change, I've already started on it, a little, and I'm a little happy about it, I'm not in a hurry to get my hopes up yet.  Stay tuned.