On Writer’s Block and Ray Bradbury

September 14, 2024 by Harvey

In today’s Journal

* A New Short Story
* Yesterday
* On Writer’s Block and Ray Bradbury
* Of Interest
* The Numbers

A New Short Story

“Barbecue” went live yesterday at 10 a.m. on my Stanbrough Writes Substack. Go check it out.

If you enjoy it, tell Everyone. If you don’t, shhh! (grin)

Yesterday

Weird. Yesterday I wrote my short story for the week: “Lars Manhattan and the Toast of the Town.”

I suspect it’s the worst piece of crap I’ve ever written, but I also suspect the reader won’t be able to put it down. That’s what I mean by weird.

Anyway, I’ll post it someday to the Stanbrough Writes substack. I might even post it a little early to get it over with.

On Writer’s Block and Ray Bradbury

In November, Dean Wesley Smith is going to begin offering classes on ways to beat different kinds of Writer’s Block. If you’re interested, see Of Interest.

I even left a comment to say that’s probably a good idea, but I do disagree on a few things.

First, I personally define writer’s block as the seeming inability Within Yourself to sit down and Just Write.

When your story feels “stuck,” trust yourself and your characters and just write the next sentence, and the next and the next. Soon the story will be racing along again. I promise.

When the story’s ACTUALLY stuck and there is no “next sentence” forthcoming, get up and walk away from it for awhile. It probably isn’t stuck. It might be just percolating.

But remember Heinlein’s Rule 2: Finish what you write. After you’ve been away for an hour or two, come back and just write the next sentence. And the next. Lather, rinse, repeat.

If you absolutely can’t finish it, throw it out and write something else.

In my personal definition of writer’s block, notice that “within yourself” part. I do not include Life Rolls and Life Happens (small life rolls) in my definition of writer’s block.

Life Rolls, which I personally define as big disturbances that require you to shift your priorities, emotions, and focus elsewhere for awhile. Examples of my definition are

• your house is on fire,

• the loss of a loved one,

• your recent marriage,

• your recent divorce, and

• anything else big that demands your attention for an unspecified amount of time.

And sometimes Life Happens. For example, events like

• scheduled or pop-up appointments,

• scheduled or pop-up visits,

• vehicle break downs,

• internet or electricity outages, and

• other inescapable problems that require your attention for a limited amount of time.

Neither of those are catalysts for writer’s block. They are external, can’t-avoid events. That they happen is outside your control. How they affect you and your “gut response” is also outside your control.

How you deal with them is up to you. I recommend getting through them and getting them over with as quickly as you can so you can get back to your personal version of normal.

But again, writer’s block is the seeming inability Within Yourself to sit down and Just Write. In other words, writer’s block is all on you.

Here’s an example:

Yesterday morning, as I filed yesterday’s edition of TNDJ, the thought that I need to write a short story for this week occurred to me.

Sometimes I’m so wrapped up in writing a novel that I forget I need to write a short story for the challenge. Fortunately, I send Bradbury Challenge participants a reminder email once a week, so that helps me remember too.

But beyond remembering a story is due, it’s not a problem. If I hadn’t written that story yesterday after the novel wrapped, I’d write that one or another one today. And if Life Happened, shrug, I’d write it tomorrow.

How can I know that? Because I don’t have writer’s block. For me, it simply doesn’t exist.

Writer’s block doesn’t exist for me because the story itself doesn’t matter. What matters is that I write it.

Then I realized that back when I took the Bradbury Challenge the first time (2014-2015), I did so to “force” myself to write at least one short story per week.

In other words, I did it to get in the habit of writing. I did it to beat writer’s block. It’s a way to “turn the fear upside down,” as Dean used to say.

Instead of allowing myself to fear

• whether I can write a “good” story, or

• whether I can follow that with a “good” story again, or

• whether anyone else will like my writing, or

• whether I’m worthy of being called a writer, or the ever popular

• “What’s the point?”,

I realized those are all unreasoning fears, and I turned those fears on their head.

The one thing I allowed myself to fear (and still do) is how I’ll feel personally, within myself, if I fail to do something as ridiculously easy as writing at least one short story every 7 days.

In other words, I used the Bradbury Challenge to beat back writer’s block before writer’s block even gained a foothold.

And if you just said or thought, “It isn’t that easy,” sorry, but you’re wrong.

Writing—the physical act of putting new words on the page—IS easy. And it’s been easy ever since you got a firm grasp on the alphabet.

And if you just said or thought, “Well, yeah, but THAT kind of writing is different from writing a story,” ennnhhhh! you’re wrong again.

If you can write an email or a letter to a friend, you can write a short story.

The secret is to not invest the short story with the weight of the world: all your fears about whether it will be “good” or whether anyone else (including magazine publishers) will like it, etc.

As I’ve said in this space many times, your chosen job is to Write Fiction.

Judging what you’ve written is the reader’s job, not yours. But readers can’t do their job if you don’t do your job first.

So if you’re one who has thought about entering the Bradbury Challenge but you haven’t quite been able to bring yourself to do it, this is your wake-up call.

Set your jaw and decide you will write at least one short story every week. Then Just Do It.

Grab a character with whatever problem (can be an annoying runny nose or an untied shoelace or a small stone in his boot or whatever). Then drop him or her into a setting, put your fingers on the keyboard, and just write whatever happens. It really is that easy.

If you want to hold your own feet to the fire, send me your story title, word count, and genre once a week and I’ll publish your results in TNDJ.

Or start your own Substack. For one absolutely excellent example, see our own Adam Kozak’s substack at https://substack.com/adamwrites.

It works folks. If you want to beat so-called “writer’s block,” start your own Bradbury Challenge and write at least one short story per week. You really won’t be sorry.

Talk with you again soon.

Of Interest

Increasing Your Fiction Writing Production

Writer’s Block Freedom

Episode 964: Busted for AI!

The Numbers

The Journal……………………………… 1190

Writing of “Lars Manhattan and the Toast of the Town”

Day 1…… 2458 words. To date…… 2458 (done)

Writing of Blackwell Ops 28: Ariana Ramos

Day 1…… 2583 words. To date…… 2583
Day 2…… 1339 words. To date…… 3922
Day 3…… 1526 words. To date…… 5448
Day 4…… 3941 words. To date…… 9389 (Sep1)
Day 5…… 2734 words. To date…… 12123
Day 6…… 2584 words. To date…… 14707
Day 7…… 3711 words. To date…… 18418
Day 8…… 3668 words. To date…… 22086
Day 9…… 0613 words. To date…… 22699
Day 10…. 2568 words. To date…… 25267
Day 11…. 3325 words. To date…… 28592
Day 12…. 2127 words. To date…… 30719
Day 13…. 1092 words. To date…… 31811
Day 14…. 1351 words. To date…… 33162
Day 15…. 4267 words. To date…… 37429
Day 16…. 1482 words. To date…… 38911 (done)

Fiction for September…………………….. 39630
Fiction for 2024………………………….… 651136
Fiction since October 1…………………… 823418
Nonfiction for September………………… 13790
Nonfiction for 2024……………………….. 288630
2024 consumable words…………………. 808991

Average Fiction WPD (September)……… 3048

2024 Novels to Date……………………… 13
2024 Novellas to Date……………………. 0
2024 Short Stories to Date………………. 9
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………….. 95
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)……………. 9
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)………. 246
Short story collections……………………. 29

Disclaimer: I am a prolific professional fiction writer, but please try this at home. You can do it. On this blog I teach Writing Into the Dark and adherence to Heinlein’s Rules. Unreasoning fear and the myths of writing are lies. They will slow your progress as a writer or stop you cold. I will never teach the myths on this blog.

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