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kRe4ture t1_iy9yfls wrote

How do you overcome writers block?

And in terms of writing speed, are you more a GRR Martin or a Brandon Sanderson?

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barrylyga OP t1_iya0zwg wrote

I'm a writer's block atheist -- I just don't believe in it. 😅

Nine times out of ten, "writer's block" boils down to "I'm bored with my story" or "I don't know what happens next."

So... If you're bored, shake that fucker up! Do something crazy! Hell, maybe you'll delete it later, but for now, it gets the words flowing again.

If you're unsure what happens next, you do one of two things: 1) Go back to the last place things made sense and go in a different direction from there, or 2) Skip ahead to the next thing you know has to happen. You can fill in the gaps later.

There are no rules -- you don't have to write the book in the order people will read it in. I wrote my novel BANG in twenty-minute bursts while taking care of my infant daughter, a paragraph here, a paragraph there, all out of order, then later figured out how to put it together. (Then again, my mutant super-power is being able to hold an entire novel in my head until it's finished, so... YMMV.)

Some more thoughts on block: https://barrylyga.com/writing-advice-5-writers-block/

And I'm definitely a Sanderson, I guess, if those are my choices. Pretty fast. Wrote five books in one year once.

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kRe4ture t1_iya1ehu wrote

Thanks a lot for the quick answer.

I am not at all familiar with any of your books, which one would you recommend to a Fantasy and SciFi fanatic like me?

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barrylyga OP t1_iya2rem wrote

I guess it depends on what kind of fantasy and sci-fi you're into. I always like to recommend The Secret Sea to self-avowed SF/F fans. It's got kids as the main characters, but in the same way Salems Lot has a kid as a main character, you know?

There are also the Flash books and the Thanos novel, if you lean toward comic books at all.

And my latest -- UNEDITED -- has some sort of avant garde speculative elements. I wouldn't call it SF/F, but then again, I'm not sure WHAT I would call it!

Oh! And if you like near-future stuff, there's The Hive, which I wrote in collaboration with my wife. (And she didn't leave me!)

Jesus, you asked for "one" and I listed a dozen. I suck. 😂🤣

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