this is interesting and helpful advice. i remember approaching the middle of my current novel-in-progress and having that feeling of "uh oh, now what?" there was a scene i knew would skip ahead in timeline (i generally write chronologically), but it felt "hot" to me, so i wrote it—and having that energy helped push me past the paralysis. whatever we can do to trick ourselves. now i'm super close to finishing, but even tho i know the ending, i have a different kind of paralysis—a very inconvenient, 11th-hour surge of doubt whether i can pull the whole thing off, whether the threads are tied up enough but not too tightly. curious if you've ever had that feeling, and how you trick yourself there?
This comes at exactly the right moment for me. I, like you describe, have been stuck at the middle, right around 90 pages, of this second novel. I've been inspired by what you wrote to think about structure differently. It's already taken one shift--from alternating pov chapters, to moving one of those characters into an earlier scene in the first section. I'm thinking now, this character will have the entire middle to herself! We'll see where that takes me. Also, been consumed with preparing for my book launch. Another distracting factor, albeit a fun one.
“I feel stupid that I didn’t remember how I had tricked myself with the first novel”—I love this. Some things you just have to learn (*I* have had to learn) again and again
this is interesting and helpful advice. i remember approaching the middle of my current novel-in-progress and having that feeling of "uh oh, now what?" there was a scene i knew would skip ahead in timeline (i generally write chronologically), but it felt "hot" to me, so i wrote it—and having that energy helped push me past the paralysis. whatever we can do to trick ourselves. now i'm super close to finishing, but even tho i know the ending, i have a different kind of paralysis—a very inconvenient, 11th-hour surge of doubt whether i can pull the whole thing off, whether the threads are tied up enough but not too tightly. curious if you've ever had that feeling, and how you trick yourself there?
This comes at exactly the right moment for me. I, like you describe, have been stuck at the middle, right around 90 pages, of this second novel. I've been inspired by what you wrote to think about structure differently. It's already taken one shift--from alternating pov chapters, to moving one of those characters into an earlier scene in the first section. I'm thinking now, this character will have the entire middle to herself! We'll see where that takes me. Also, been consumed with preparing for my book launch. Another distracting factor, albeit a fun one.
“I feel stupid that I didn’t remember how I had tricked myself with the first novel”—I love this. Some things you just have to learn (*I* have had to learn) again and again