Tag Archives: writing tips

My Writing Day

If I’d written this post a few years ago, I think it would have been chaotic as hell. 5am starts one day, writing at a coffee shop the next… There was a time when there was no such thing as a typical writing day, but now I have four — count ’em — four spare days in the week to write, I have something of a routine.

Now, I use the word ‘routine’ quite loosely as, like most people, I’m prone to occasional bouts of procrastination. Actually, scratch that, I would class myself as a pathological procrastinator. I could write a post on it, and one day I probably will. But, putting phone scrolling and back-to-back episodes of MAFS aside, I now have a process. Here it is.

  • I wake up at about 6.30am and instead of getting up immediately to start creating my masterpiece I spend at least an hour sitting in bed, drinking coffee, making plans, reading books and, yep, scrolling social media. An essential part of my day — springing out of bed as soon as I wake up makes me feel like my life is some kind of boot camp.
  • Currently, I’m going to the gym first thing. This will not last.
  • Desk time, usually by 9am, accompanied by another coffee and one of my cats, Milo, who likes to sit on my desk and look out of the window for his enemies.
  • I usually start by reading the chapter/scene I finished on my previous writing day — I need to get my head back in the story and take the opportunity to correct typos, do a bit of light editing. All the fun stuff.
  • I keep a running sidebar on the writing app Scrivener with notes — ideas for future scenes and reminders to marry up plot points. I plan my novels but every now and then inspiration strikes and if I don’t make a note of it, it will go up to the big word bin in the sky.
  • I literally lose track of the hours while I write — I write quite fast, usually upwards of 2000 words per session, so if I’m in the zone and amped up on caffeine it’s midday before I know it. Like a 90s supermodel, I sometimes ‘forget to eat’, but unlike a 90s supermodel, I make up for lost time when I’m reminded.
  • My brain is like Swiss cheese in the afternoon. There’s no helping it, I’m a morning person and unless I take my laptop to a cafe and hope for a second wind, it’s game over. But, I do admin instead — emails, updating my work diary and so on.
  • Another thing I often do in the afternoon is plan my next book. Even though I’ve run out of steam with the manuscript for the day I can still write page after page of story ideas. It’s the writing equivalent of having room for dessert after a big meal. If the dessert was a notebook full of slightly unhinged stream-of-consciousness scrawling.
  • Then, it’s family time, dinner time and sofa time. If I’m on a deadline for edits, this might be laptop time again, but I try to avoid it. Working in the evening gives me exam cramming flashbacks and I Do. Not. Like it.

So, if you guessed that I’m writing this in the afternoon admin slot, then you’d be correct. And tomorrow it starts all over again, except for the gym part. Probably.

The Magic Writing Coat

What do you do when you sit at your desk and the blank page is looking back at you like a stubborn child? No matter how many Haribos or trips to soft play on offer, this laptop is simply not going to play ball and write you a thousand words of fiction gold. So, you need to invoke the writing gods some other way, right?

The above situation is one I’ve been in many, many times, and I’d like to talk about the various ways I’ve tried to get around it. Some successful, some… not so much.

  • Going for a walk. The big one. The stone-cold classic. This works, to be fair. Getting outside for some fresh air and a viewpoint beyond the window in front of my desk is probably one of the best ways to break out of a slump. Endorphins, North Yorkshire air, and the feel of a welly boot underfoot does it for me almost every time.
  • Lighting a candle. Another favourite, and one I think I decided to try after reading Joanne Harris’s Ten Things About Writing about using objects as a psychological prop to get into a writing headspace. She mentions a candlestick, which sounds very classy, but I find a knock-off Jo Malone candle from Aldi works just as nicely. The rule is, once it’s lit, it’s writing time, and it’s pretty effective.
  • Listening to writing podcasts. Sometimes when I’m sitting, staring vacantly at the screen, it’s easy to forget that I’m doing this as an actual job now. This feeling is what I like to think of as the bastard love-child of imposter syndrome and procrastination – it doesn’t really matter if I just start scrolling Twitter anyway, as it’s not real work. The best way around this for me is to listen to podcast interviews with authors, or writers just chatting about their writing life. It reminds me that no matter what the process is, there are people out there whose books started on a laptop just like mine, and all I need to do is write it. Some favourites – The Honest Authors Podcast, In Writing with Hattie Crisell, and Novel Experience with Kate Sawyer.
  • The Magic Writing Coat. No, really. My partner’s mum once bought me this very exotic looking cardigan. It’s grey, knee length, and has a jazzy multi-coloured aztec-style pattern. I started wearing it when I was writing during the colder months and the room was a bit chilly, but then I realised it made me feel all whimsical and writery, and evoked images of a struggling writer in a Parisian garret in December. So, that worked too.
  • Writing something else. Anything will do if it fills a blank screen for the time being. Blog posts (like this one), ideas or outlines for other novels, editing another manuscript that needs tending to, or writing a short story or flash fiction for a competition. I particularly like the last one, as I’m a fan of nervously refreshing an inbox to see if I’ve been shortlisted or not. See above re: procrastination.
  • Pomodoro technique. We can file this under things that are not so successful for me, but I’ve listed it as others swear by it. If you aren’t familiar, it’s a time-management method where you set an alarm and work in 25 minute stretches and have timed breaks. No thanks. My smartphone already has way more control over me than I’d like, so letting the countdown timer tell me what to do feels like I’m edging too close to my very own Black Mirror story.

So there we have it – some of the ways you can break out of being paralysed by an empty page. I’d love to know what other people like to do when the words aren’t flowing, whether it’s consulting your tarot cards, going for a run, or sinking into a pint of gin. We all have our ways.