Writing always evolves as it progresses: characters change eye and hair colour; names change; subplots develop; you decide the whole thing belongs in a different time period or setting. It’s tempting when you realise something needs to change to go back and correct it from the beginning of your manuscript: that way you can progress knowing that all is in order. However, there are a few problems with this approach:

1. It takes longer to nail down a first draft 
A first draft has lots of energy as it’s the draft where you’re discovering the story as you write, and that gives it momentum. If you go back to correct whilst writing the first draft, it’s easy to lose that sense of excitement and the energy in your writing will fade.

2. You get fed up
If you constantly go back and edit things whilst writing the first draft, you can easily start to feel bored. This is because you’re going over the same material time and time again. If you feel bored, it’s very hard to crank out that first draft – writing becomes a chore, not a pleasure.

3. You’ll probably change your mind again
When you write a long piece, such as a novel, there are hundreds of strands you need to keep track of and ultimately tie together into a satisfying story. Change one bit, and you have to change other bits. Then if you decide actually your first idea was better, you have to go back and change it all back again. This all takes time, it’s tedious, and you’re more likely to lose patience with the whole thing and give up.

Here’s a technique that I use in my own writing which ensures I get the first draft written quickly, I keep track of all the changes I need to make, and without spending precious time going back and editing. I use a technique called writing ‘as if’.  It works like this. Imagine I’m writing a novel about someone called Dora who lives in 1900. Part way through writing, I think it would be more fun if she was called Edna and lived in 1920. Obviously, I can do a ‘find and replace’ for the name change, but there are huge implications for the story in changing the time setting. Instead of going back and making all the necessary changes, I simply type in capital letters across the page:

FROM THIS POINT ON DORA = EDNA
FROM THIS POINT ON SET IN 1920

To make it stand out all the more, I often make the font larger, and colour the text in red. I then carry on writing AS IF I have gone back and made the changes. In other words, I write the rest of the piece with the character called Edna, and set in 1920, with all the implications associated with that change. I also make a note in a notebook I keep for editing purposes, describing the changes I’ve made and jotting down what I’ll need to attend to when I come to rewrite.
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It means that I can keep on writing without having to stop, go back, and make changes, and it means I know where to focus when it comes to the rewrite: tackling all those notes made in my editing notebook. If I then change my mind again later on, I simply write:

FROM THIS POINT ON SET IN FRANCE

make a note in my notebook, and keep on writing, as if I’ve gone back and made the changes.
I’ve found this technique helps me to keep writing without feeling bogged down, and without worrying that I’ll miss something. By jotting all the changes down, I keep my mind clear for writing, instead of trying to hold all the changes in my head. It makes both the first draft and subsequent rewrites much smoother and faster.

Try it, and let me know how you get on!

I’ve talked before about the importance of having a routine to your writing: a set time of day when you write, writing in the same place, and writing in the same way, all of which serve to invoke muscle memory and get you into your writing session more quickly. Writing rituals are a way of reinforcing your writing routine, but they also act on your emotions and can help you to overcome writers’ block.

Writing rituals include anything you do when you’re writing that don’t relate to the writing itself. Rituals could be lighting a scented candle, the clothes you wear, music you play in the background, what you drink while you’re writing. For example, I like to put some scented oil in a burner, have the radio on low in the background, and make a cup of coffee in my special mug, and use the fountain pen my grandmother bought me, when I’m writing. I know of another writer who paints her nails bright colours. Others wear business clothes; some do their hair and makeup; some have a lovely china teapot that only gets used when they’re writing.

Having a writing ritual helps to remind your brain that it’s writing time now so better come up with something to write about. They also remind you that you don’t need to ask anyone’s permission to write. Writers commonly suffer from anxiety about their writing: am I good enough, what if my writing’s rubbish, who am I to try to write? Writing rituals can send a powerful message that you’re worth it – worth the posh cup and saucer and the handmade biscuits; worth the makeup that makes you feel a million dollars – and worth the time and effort you’re putting into your writing.

It’s very easy for writers to put off writing: to get time and space for writing often means negotiating with others and insisting that your needs are just as valid as others’. It’s hard to do that if you have nothing to show people yet, especially if you’re feeling a little uncertain about your work. Small yet frequent acts of self care can help to combat that uncertainty and give you the confidence to stand up for your writing. Whatever makes you feel pampered or special will do it, whether it’s using the best cup or putting on a slick of red lipstick before you start writing.

These small habits are reminders to yourself that you deserve this time and space for writing, and help to transform writing time from a chore into a treat. It’s easy to see writing time as work – there’s a natural anxiety about whether the words will come at all, and if they do whether any of them will be useable. But if you set up the session with a series of rituals that nurture you, the session is less fraught from the start and becomes less about the words per se and more about you nurturing a need within yourself.

To me, the best rituals work on different senses: the lingering fragrance of a scented candle reminds you throughout the day how you’re moving forwards with your writing and staying committed to it. The flash of brightly coloured fingernails over the keyboard makes the words dance. Music can heighten the mood you’re creating within your writing.

Over the years I’ve known and worked with many writers. Here are some of their writing rituals. If any of them appeal to you, why not adopt them and see what effect it has on your writing?
• Playing music in the background
• Lighting a scented candle
• Painting their fingernails
• Putting on makeup
• Wearing their favourite clothes
• Flowers on their desk
• Using a special cup and saucer
• Making a ‘proper’ cup of coffee
• Making tea in a china teapot
• Drinking a delicious blend of herbal tea
• Sitting in the chair that has the view of the garden
• Eating a posh biscuit
• Doing yoga before writing
• Meditating

​I’d love to know about your writing rituals. Tell me about them in the comments below.
Happy writing,
Kim

My short story ‘Cat Chat’ is published today in the People’s Friend magazine, and in this post I’m going to write about where the idea for the story came from, and how I adapted and shaped my initial thought into the finished piece. Like many writers, I’m quite shameless about pinching stories from my family and friends. Often someone will tell me something and I’ll mentally file it away thinking, ‘I can do something with that.’ The ‘thing’ they’ve said might be a phrase or a comment, or it might be an anecdote. I never use other people’s stories in the same format they told them to me: I strip down the idea to find the bit that captured my imagination, then I play with it until I get a story, so the final story bears no resemblance to the original. This is how I did it with ‘Cat Chat’.

My family is one of pet-talkers: people who act as ventriloquist for the dog or cat. Maybe you’re one yourself, or maybe you’ve come across people like that, people who put on a special voice for the dog and conduct a conversation with it, seemingly oblivious to the fact they’re talking to themselves. Maybe you think it’s cute; maybe you think they’re bonkers. Anyway, in my house we talk for the cat. If you’re not sure what people actually say when they talk for the cat, here’s a typical exchange between me and my cat, Harriet:

Me: Look at that cute dog on the telly.
Harriet: I don’t approve of dogs. They’re not as good as cats.
Me: It’s a clever doggy, doing tricks.
Harriet: See what I mean? You’d never find a cat doing that. Imagine working for a living! Cats are far too clever.

When I met my husband, and he first heard me talking for my cats, he thought I was bonkers. Fast forward a couple of months and not only was he also talking for the cats, he’d adopted his own special voice for doing so. We were talking about his first reaction to hearing me talking for the cats when I realised there was a story in it.

Firstly, I needed a conflict. As it was a story about talking for a cat, there had to be a talker and someone who found it weird. And because I love writing stories for the People’s Friend that involve a grandmother and granddaughter, I went for those characters and had the grandmother as the cat-talker and the granddaughter worried about it. Now for the inciting incident, the thing that kicks off the story. As the granddaughter has known about the cat-talking all her life, why does she suddenly find it weird? Answer: she’s a teenager who’s just got a boyfriend and is worried what he’ll think about it and is scared he’ll dump her. To up the stakes and to add a touch of humour, I made the grandmother very gentle and the cat a bit of a thug:

“How’s my best boy then?” asked Nanna, bending to stroke Bandit.
“Alright, old girl. Where’s me grub?” said Bandit, in a low, gravelly voice and distinct East End gangsterish accent.
“You hungry, my poppet?”
“Starvin’! Me stomach finks me froat’s bin slit,” said Bandit.

The girl is determined that her boyfriend won’t ever meet Nanna, and Nanna is equally determined to meet the new boyfriend to give him the once-over and make sure he’s good enough. So there was the set-up. All of them nice characters but with genuine conflict arising from their personalities. Next I had to increase the conflict.

I like to vary the sources of conflict within stories, so if the inciting action comes from outside the main character (from another character or from a situation), the next conflict comes from within the character herself. In this case, I made her feel terrible guilt at wanting to keep Nanna and the boyfriend apart. She loves her Nanna, yet is embarrassed by her, and feels terrible about it. I twisted the knife a little to increase the conflict and (hopefully) get the reader to ask ‘How is this ever going to be resolved?’ by adding a scene where the girl tries to talk to her mother about her concerns:

That evening, in the car, I said, tentatively, “Mum, do you think it’s odd how Nanna talks for the cat?”
“She’s always done it.”
“I know, but is it weird, do you think?”
“Her mum, my grandma, was just the same,” Mum said, indicating the turning into our road. “I asked her about it once and she said her grandmother was just the same.”
Great, so it’s hereditary.
Mum pulled up outside our house and tugged on the handbrake. She glanced across at me. “Why? It doesn’t bother you, does it?”
“No, it’s just … I wondered what other people might think.” The blood flooded my cheeks as I said it.
“Stuff what other people think,” Mum said. “Come on! Homework, then dinner.”

Next I had to figure out how to resolve this. There are a few rules with story endings: they can’t come about by chance or fate, they must be the result of the character’s own actions, and they must be in character. I normally sketch out as many potential resolutions to the story as I can and then see which one is most natural but least likely to be spotted in advance by the reader. Keep them guessing to the end if possible! In this story I gave the grandmother a sore throat and the granddaughter speaks for the cat on her behalf, resolving both the original conflict (what will the boyfriend think about Nanna speaking for the cat?) and the emotional conflict (the guilt about feeling embarrassed).

If you’d like to read the whole story, it’s available now in the People’s Friend magazine dated 10th February, 2018.