What should I write now?
Picture by me. No my red bud isn’t blooming yet, a girl can wish!
I’ve taken a break from writing for a couple of weeks, and focused on reading instead. I’ve been “reading like a writer”, which means paying attention to the craft in the novels and short stories I’ve been inhaling. I read a couple of non-fiction books just for fun because I didn’t have to read them this way. I’ll keep reading through this weekend, but on Monday I have to start writing again.
I have three choices before me:
Jump into the third draft of my novel—I will be incorporating comments from several people as I write the novel fresh into a new document this time. I need to add a lot of internal monologue, beef up the secondary characters, add more background and explanation to some of the phenomena, and other things.
Start writing a couple of short stories—I’ve been away from writing short stories for so long, I want to get a couple of them at least started and maybe outlined. Maybe a flash and a longer one would work. I haven’t had anything out on submission for a while and I’d like to remedy that.
Focus on poetry—I currently only have two packets of poetry out on submission, and I would like to have more. I’m also starting to run low on silly poetry for this newsletter. I could spend a week poetry-focused and refill that well.
All are good choices. There’s a voice in my head saying “get back to the novel”, but I’ve been working on the novel, and little else, for a couple of years now. A part of me says an extended break from it would do me some good and taking maybe a month to focus on writing other things will leave me fresher and more eager to get back into the novel.
Oh, and there is an option 4. write for money. I did get one assignment this week. It’s the first I’ve gotten all year. Cross your fingers I get more. I’m not actively chasing down freelance work yet. I hope I don’t reach that point.
Do you have any advice or ideas? Let me know.