New Week, New Work

So this week I'm feeling a little better about my "Actively Writing" story. On Mike's advice, I wrote an out-of-sequence scene -- an exercise I haven't done in a while. The scene I created is completely out-of-sequence and when I was done, it made me smile. It was a great moment between two of my favorite characters in this story. And it seems to have lifted some of my block. I have finally (FINALLY!!) finished Chapter 8.

Another thing I'm using to get things going and reorganize both my active story and the stories I'm editing is a character dossier. It's based in part on the character sheets of my youth (Oh, yes, I am a gamer. I know what THAC0 is.) and in part on more official information gathering paperwork. I hadn't really thought about doing these until I was re-reading my murder mystery and saw the part I'd written about the forensic report. I haven't done these in years, but I remember it did help a lot to remind myself of small details I might forget as the story grows longer. And, now that I'm more savvy with computer programs, I can create a web of connections and see where all my relationships are. So I've created a sheet to work with, and now, all I should need to do is fill in the blanks! We'll see if it works with both my writing and editing processes to get things going in the right directions.

I'll tell you how it's going next week!