Writer's Block Fix!

Sometimes writing feels like careening blindly down the road to hell. 

And it's not like it's a quick trip, nor is it always obvious you are on the Highway to Hell. 

Nope, you may actually believe you are on the Candy Land Freeway, but then something happens and suddenly those bright jewel-tone jujube hedges that whip by as you zip along, don't look so tasty. In fact they seem to have melted into black pools of gummy goo, sort of like your thought process. You plod along for a while, stall out a few times as your words become more elusive and harder to pin down. Finally you come to a dead stop when your red licorice expressway decays into a fiery stretch of hot lava.

Your imagination is tapped. The writing has ceased. 

As the Soup Nazi would say - No Words for You! 

This process is repetitive, which is hellish in its own way and makes you wonder about the sanity of writers. Why bother to continue? Simple answer; we'd feel crazier if we stopped.

Sometimes I return after a brief lull in creative creation, with heady anticipation. My characters eager for further adventures, my plot bubbling, as excitement drips from my fingers onto my key board. Ew. That sounds sort of gross and my drippy fingers may be more the result of a broken air conditioner and wackadoo hormones, but I digress. What I was trying to say is my typing skills are maxed to keep pace with the seemingly endless perfect words that explode from my imagination. Trust me. This happens and it is sublime. (Love that word. It is so sublimely sublime.)

Other times, like right this very instant, my words hide from me, just out of reach. I've been nearly wordless for the entire summer, peeps. Writer's Block to the extreme. But I have a plan. This weekend I am off with my writing group, The Anitas, on our annual retreat to Grindstone Provincial Park at Christina Janz' cottage. It has been the solution to my past writing woes, so I am certain  hoping it will be the fix to my current predicament.

How can I be so sure?

There will be zero distractions; no kids, Internet, phone, laundry, wall scrubbing or window washing for me. Stop laughing. There was this one time I washed some windows.  My point is I will be hyper-focused, obsessed even, with stalking those verbs, nouns, prepositions, and conjunctions from their cozy hidey-hole in the back corner of my brain. (I can sense they are chilling out right behind the grey matter that controls my constant cravings for chocolate.)

Crap. Now all I can think about is brownies. And Hershey Kisses. Wait, what if there was a Hershey Kiss brownie? Must Google...

Sweet Mama! There is an entire Hershey Kisses site!

Hershey Kisses Recipes

What was I blogging about? Right. Writing distractions. 

I do believe I have made my point.

What if Chocolate had Zero Calories?

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Another summer has begun at our wee cottage overlooking, Manitoba’s own inland sea, Lake Winnipeg. It’s a small piece of paradise hidden, in the heart of the Canadian prairies. Another summer, I am fortunate to spend with my family, swimming, kayaking, sandcastle building, and (whenever possible) writing.

The kids are off for a quick swim, so I have a few minutes to sit at my computer, tap away at the keyboard, letting my imagination explore new worlds and all the characters that inhabit them. My mind is flooded with my favourite question.

What if?

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And not just the cliché, wah-wah-wah questions like; What if we could fly? Or What if the moon was made of cheese? Or What if chocolate had zero calories, cured cancer and was the fifth food group, but has too weak a lobby group to compete with the all-powerful dairy, grains and protein lobbyists? Okay, so maybe the last one is my own personal what if, but I think you can see where I’m going.

Currently I’m working on Gemini, a paranormal YA about twins. It’s the first in a trilogy called Triggered. The protagonist is Kate and the story is told from her point of view. Her brother, Chris, is the assistant protagonist.

“But Jodi,” you may ask (or not depending if you talk to your computer screen as much as I do.) “Can you have an assistant lead character?”

And I would have to ask you back, “But what if you can? What if you HAD to?”

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Which of course would lead me deep into a “what if” chain of questions.

What if two characters were so interconnected that you couldn’t have one full character without the other and what if something was changing, deep inside one, but not the other? And what if that something that was changing was dangerous – even deadly? And what if for the sake of one, the other had to be hidden? But what if they hid the wrong twin?

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What if, I ask you, what if?

This is the flow of my “what ifs” at this very moment and I’m amazed where each new “what if” is taking Kate and Chris. I feel more of an observer, along to record their journey, marvelling at their courage and fearing for their survival.

Oh, wait! I feel another “what if” coming on –

“What if I had a Hershey Kiss machine hidden behind a false wall in my attic? And what if I was the only one who knew…”

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