I honestly have to say that too many authors rely too heavily on technique and trying to write their stories using a formula that, in the end, they ruin the story. While technique is important and you cannot write without using your technique correctly, thinking too hard can result in a story that lacks a voice to really suck the reader into the lives of the characters.
Effective writers have found that more of then not, their gut instincts tell them exactly what they need to do with their stories. The hard part about all of this is trusiting that gut feeling.
As you run your characters through all of the various scenes in your story, you have to just trust them every now and then to do the write thing and say the write thing. You cannot insert your own thoughts and your own personality onto those characters. In other words, think about if your characters would really say or do that, or is it you? It is these moments that you are not trustin gyour characters.
Now, with that said, I am not saying that you should let the characters do whatever they want. I am always cautious about authors that tell me their characters are "yelling at me to tell their stories." Your characters should not have this much power over your stories.
I do believe your writing will flow much better if you learn to truast those feeligns about the story you're working on. If you think there should be an extra scene inserted, then there is probably a good reason for it.
Just learn to "go with the flow."
Scott
This is so true. I believe that when the characters start "acting up" it is really the writers instinct telling them that something is wrong plot-wise. Best solution is to go backwards and figure out where you need to start over.
ReplyDeleteThis is also why it is important that your characters fit well with your plot.