I've had more than a month away from noveling, since I gave myself some time off after finishing revision at the end of November. And for the past two weeks, I've been in complete vacation mode, rarely typing up more than a few sentences at a time for any reason. It was a wonderful break, full of reading and family and friends and a week on the Mendocino coast. I'm grateful that I was able to take the time, and I definitely succeeded in relaxing and clearing my mind.
Now the issue is that I might be a bit too relaxed. A couple of weeks after I stopped revising, I reported how weird it was not to be working on a novel. Well, I'm quite used to it now. I think I could be perfectly untroubled by spending a few more weeks simply going through my to-read list.
However, I believe it's time to boot up my writing brain and get back to work. This little blog post was a start. Then of course I'll have to review the books I read during vacation. And maybe write some email or something. After that, once I'm really sure I still know how to compose a paragraph, I'm sure I'll make my way back to fiction.
I don't want to rush into it, though. I could strain something. I'm almost certain that's how it works.
Good Stuff Out There:
→ At The Millions, Toni Jordan considers the question of where writers get their ideas: "I think 'write what you know' is the single worst piece of writing advice. Instead, write what you're really interested in. Write what is going to keep you awake at night; write what you don't understand; write to figure something out. Good novels are journeys into the unknown, for their authors as well as their readers."
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