The WMB: The Reveal, Part Two

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

Catch Up:

Check out Part One of this blog posted on October 9. I’ll wait till you get back.
………
Okay? Let’s go on.

Chasing the WMB:

I run into a few problems when I try to be Megan Multipublished or Gertie Goenslow. One being I haven’t sewn since I was in 4-H, don’t like glue on my fingers, and… well you get the idea. If I try to be Gertie Goenslow, I can lay on the couch just fine. Oh yeah. I am writing fast, or as is usually the case, dictating madly with my voice recognition software, spronging wildly. When I emerge from my writing stupor, yes, I’ve blasted through. Pages. Blasted through to… ?

I have a client who writes extremely slowly. Every day. By the time she finishes the book, she makes one or two pass throughs. Note to those desperately scratching notes: STOP! You’re doing it again. Ask yourself why does she write her books this way?

Because she has tried every other alleged magic bullet, and this one works for her.

On the other hand, I also have clients who carefully do their pre-writing, and then blow through their first draft as fast as they can go, often participating in a Book in a Week challenge. HEY! Same note to those desperately scratching: Why do they do it this way?

Because they have tried every other magic bullet, and this one works for them.

Here’s a third scenario. I wrote a contemporary woman’s novel, where I did what I would call significant pre-writing (a synopsis, a trace through of the hero’s journey, etc.), then I wrote like mad through the first draft. It was fast, it was ugly, and it was exhilarating.

Now I’m writing a middle grade story. In my formulaic manner (the blogger teaches herself here and yells, “HEY! STOP!”), I have tried to write it the same way as the women’s contemporary. After a summer off from teaching, and no rough draft of my fantastical little beings, it’s obviously not working. I have asked myself in my reflective time (and shrieked during my working time), why is it not working? It’s a magic bullet that worked for me before.

As promised…The Reveal:

The answer to the question is the technique that I use, whether I write slow or fast through the first draft, is not the magic bullet. I am the magic bullet.

Hmmm, that sounds like a piece of Flair for Facebook. I am the magic bullet. Yet I am. The magic bullet is what I perceive works for me now. The magic bullet is what I try when a previously successful technique isn’t working.

Me as the magic bullet. The opposite of insanity. You know the definition of insanity: doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. Sound like anything you’ve done ? You keep hearing about Megan Multipublished or Gertie Goenslow and keep trying to fire their WMB.

I am the magic bullet, remember? Don’t get stuck doing something that works for somebody else, if it’s not working for you. And be ready to try something different sooner than later.

Sometimes fast, sometimes slow, sometimes some of both. Stop looking for somebody else’s WMB. Theirs won’t have nearly the fire, the power, the explosion, that you have, when you’re the WMB.

As a fiction writer, writing teacher, and fiction coach, I’ve seen clients approach their first draft novel writing from many different directions over the years. There have been Megans and  Gerties and there’s been people like me. Like you.

Be the bullet. Oooh, more Flair for Facebook.

Kathleen is a fiction coach and writing teacher. She makes and shoots her own WMB in the Wasatch Mountains of Utah. http://riverwriters.com