Someone on one of my email lists mentioned the stereotype of women as multi-taskers. In my case, it is definitely true (1). I don’t know if it’s because I am so great at multi-tasking, or if I just can’t sit still for longer than 20 minutes, but I constantly bounce from one thing to the next and back (or not) again.

(1) And John fits the opposite male stereotype: he can sit and work on one task to the exclusion of everything else until it is done.

I have especially noticed this in my writing. When I talk about my progress here, it is very rarely in terms of one large chunk of one story completed. More often I write a bit on 2 or 3 (or more) different stories. Like yesterday, for instance, I wrote a bit on Godred (more on that later), made notes for my Cinderella story, and reminded myself to look something up for my Dragon story. If I try to force it and write something straight through on one story, I get nothing.

On the writing list, people often point out that to be productive (en route to being professional), you have to push yourself to write more: more words, more often. I guess I am just not to that point yet. I don’t really see myself as a professional writer, so I don’t have any deadlines (self-imposed or otherwise) greasing the wheels in my brain; maybe instead of a stewpot writing process, I need a pressure cooker. It’s something to think about, anyway.

On to my Godred story! I’m slowly getting a line on Godred the character. I tried the “interview your character” tactic, but didn’t work so well. It felt fake, forced. You might say, “He’s your character! Just make something up!” But it doesn’t really work that way. If he is a certain way, there’s a reason for it, and his behavior has to be consistent with his personality *and* his history. A personality is a complex thing; you can’t just cobble together any old characteristics and expect the result to be a believable character.

So I tried working backwards. I had a “snapshot” in my head of Godred, but how did he get that way? I also had to find a way to reconcile 2 disparate traits that I found in him (but not the 2 I originally had). It finally occurred to me that I had to change the scene, not him. And then things started falling into place. I haven’t finished the scene, but I have a better picture of it now.

There has been yet another topic discussed on the writing list that I have been following with interest. One side espouses making every detail in a story do double duty (especially in short stories): provide information and advance the plot. The other side feels this is too clinical and that some details can basically be just window dressing.

I have to say that I rather favor the first approach. I lean toward a more sparse style, without a lot of extra detail, and sometimes without enough detail to pull the reader in. Oops. The beauty of this approach is that you have to think about which details you definitely have to include, and what the reader can infer from those details, and which details are interesting/creative/funny, but have no further purpose than your own entertainment. So as I have been thinking about Godred and the reformulation of certain scenes, I have been trying to keep track of what I have explicitly told the reader, what the purpose of that information is, and what I still need/want to say. It’s a bit of a juggling act, trying to find the right place for each detail, but it will be worth it in the end.