Sure, fiction writer, you say you want to write faster. What you really want, however, is to write faster without losing quality, without giving up your writing style.
Your aim,therefore, should be to find your optimum writing speed. That speed may be faster than you write now, but it might not be. A wonderful piece by author Nalini Singh inspired this blog post. I encourage you to read her guest post.
I’ve taken Ms.Singh’s five tips, reordered and reworded them, and added two more of my own. My list is in order of helpfulness to me, from least to most. You may benefit from using any or all of these techniques.
- Overlap Your WIPs. A WIP is your Work in Progress. By keeping two or more writing projects going at once, you can shift from one to the other as your muse and mood dictate. This doesn’t work as well for those who prefer to focus on one thing until it’s complete.
- Limit Session Lengths. When I was nine years old, I didn’t enjoy practicing my cello, and eagerly stopped each day after thirty minutes. My Dad read an article about famed American cellist Leonard Rose, who said he never practiced more than four hours a day. With dry humor, Dad admonished me to limit my sessions to no more than four hours. Even if you have an entire free afternoon to write, there will come a point of diminishing returns. Whether that’s four hours for you, or some other duration,don’t exceed it.
- Get Your Blood Pumping. At some point, you may get tired, be unable to think what to write next, or write yourself into a plot hole. At such times, stand up and swing your arms around, walk up and down some stairs, go for a walk outside, or do some calisthenics. Even five minutes of that might be enough. Aside from the health benefit, you’re getting fresh blood to your brain, rebooting your system.
- Enjoy Play Time. Take ten minutes or so and devote it to uninhibited free writing. Write about anything except your WIPs. Let your mind romp and play about in the universe, without the pressure of thinking someone might read what you write. This helps you associate writing with fun, and it just might spark an idea for a future story.
- Set Writing Goals, in Pencil. Goals are funny things, aren’t they? The minute you set one, you feel a sense of purpose and direction. You feel a call to action; you start to plan and strategize. If you fall behind your schedule, or miss your goal, you feel like you’ve let someone down, even if it’s just yourself. Goals are good prompters;they urge you to complete what you start. But don’t get so focused on your goal that you feel depressed or miserable if you fall short.
- Use Chore Time. All of us must do chores, those mundane tasks that don’t require focused thought. These include showering, preparing food, mowing the lawn, cleaning your living space,commuting, etc. Why not use that time to think about the next scene you’re planning to write, or to work through solutions to plot problems? When you’re next able to write, you’ll be ready.
- Leave Yourself Wanting More.This variation of the old show business line really works. Stop your writing session at a point where you know what to write next. Try not to stop when you’re stuck for the next word. That way, the next time you sit down to write, that next word, sentence, and paragraph will flow as if you’d never stopped.
These techniques may help you write at your optimum speed. They work for author Nalini Singh, and for—
Poseidon’s Scribe