The WMB Revealed

A Guest Blog by The What If Girl, Fiction Coach Kathleen Wright

www.riverwriters.com

You Know You Want It

The Writer’s Magic Bullet, or the WMB. As a fiction writer, writing teacher, and fiction coach, I know I want it, I know you want it.

I also know that while you’re waiting for me to tell you there is no magic bullet, in that little Eden spot in the very back of your mind (the fantasy place where the NYT calls you about your new book, BOGO sales are every day, and your significant other admits, “You’re right, about everything” in front of witnesses with digital recorders) you hope I truly will reveal the WMB.

I’m talking about the productivity WMB. The one that if I find, I will write better books more quickly, and if I write better books more quickly, I will pitch better books more often. If I pitch better books more often, the odds increase that I will publish better books more often.

Here it is, the Holy Grail, the WMB of productivity. Do I blow and go through my first draft or tiptoe through the tulips of tantalizing text?

Maybe it’s happened this way with you. I read that Megan Mulitpublished sews costumes for her main characters, builds to scale miniature houses for them to live in, crafts detailed outlines of everything of her book. Ha ha, I think, that’s the WMB. That one will put me over. Detail, precision, analysis, and execution. She probably doesn’t even do a second draft!

But it isn’t long after that I hear/read about Gertie Goenslow, a lifetime resident on the New York Times bestseller list and 10 Hallmark movie adaptations.  She draft her novels languidly lying on a flower-strewn Regency-era chaise, sipping Pellegrino from Waterford, and reflecting on classical paintings while she writes in longhand on thick cream-colored paper, with a dip-in-the-inkwell fountain pen. Terms like “outline,” “pre-writing,” and “synopsis” give her the vapors; the muse must be lured and never pursued. She also must not do a second draft; it’s simply been divine dictation.

What’s a Writer To Do?

Here are some benefits and drawbacks between writing fast and writing slow, and then my revelation. (I told you I would.)

Benefits of writing fast:

You get a story that flows from beginning to end sooner. You feel productive because you were productive. You have stuff to show people. You can say your first draft is finished.

Writing fast pushes past the internal editor, can spin you into wilder thoughts. Wilder thoughts often translate into fresher ideas, brighter resolutions, and worse trouble for your characters.

The exhilarating, almost-scared feeling that you don’t know what the next word is.

If you use voice recognition software, you can talk much faster than you can type accurately.

Drawbacks to writing fast:

Spronging . Spronging is a word I invented. It’s a writing rabbit trail run amok. When I sprong, I can write pages and pages and pages of witty, wild, and wonderful words that take the story…nowhere. Many pages may have to be dumped, which is frustrating and feels counterproductive.

The timeline can suffer. If you’ve written in fits and starts, or out of sequence, you’re going to have to construct or reconstruct your timeline after the draft is completed.

Characters are not fully developed. Usually what’s missing is a thoughtful consideration of their motivation: why they do what they do. This can cause plot bog down and/or loosen your readers suspension of disbelief.

Benefits of Writing Slowly:

Spronging and “slow” are incompatible. You will move from point A to point B to point C… to point Z , unencumbered by all those shiny things glinting through the trees.

Less distractions. You have your outline, your extensive synopsis, and your character charts. You can break the story down into different segments, and work through each segment, checking things off as you go.

You’ve spent so much time developing your characters, you have no doubt what they would and wouldn’t do.

The timeline flows. Since you’re living submerged in the story, never taking a deep breath until you’re finished, you don’t have to check your timeline or fix it because… well, you’re living in it.

Drawbacks to Writing Slowly:

You don’t get past the first chapter. You think if you can get the first chapter down, the rest of the book will speed up.

Possibly, and not absolutely, the next better idea doesn’t show up. Dialogue can be less sparkling. Obstacles can be more predictable.

You get bored with the story and move on to another one until you think of how to solve the problem, so you add one more partially completed manuscript to yet another folder on your computer.

Next time:

The WMB Reveal