Out-of-WIP Experiences

AnneMarble · Jan 15, 2007

Have you ever found yourself thinking of your WIP (work in progress) as though you were a reader rather than the writer? I see it as sort of like an out-of-body experience.

This happened to me earlier today. While doing something else, I thought of a story I had been reading earlier and wondered about what would happen to the characters. Then I realized "Dang! That was my story, and I don't know yet!"

I've also had it happen when I was rereading some of my chapters.

Isn't that the neatest feeling? And yet, is it a good sign, or does it mean nothing at all except that you're a little nuts?

I guess it's a good sign because it shows you can drag a reader into your book. But I wonder what it really means?...

KTC · Jan 15, 2007

It has happened to me before, too, Anne. I take it as a good sign. When I have that a-ha moment when I realize I'm actually thinking of my own WIP, I have a moment for a second where I think, "It must be good!" Because while thinking about the story, it was actually captivating my thoughts for that brief time.

Sohia Rose · Jan 15, 2007

That happened to me with my WIP. I was reading it for entertainment and was like, "Wow, that's really interesting. What is this lady gonna do about that." Well, the lady was me. :tongue

Then I read it a few weeks later, editing it for the sixth time, and I was like, "This stinks! No one's gonna like this crap!"

greglondon · Jan 15, 2007

there's a scene in my WIP that gets me choked up every time I read it. I hope it has the same impact on other readers.

AnneMarble · Jan 15, 2007

Sohia Rose said:
That happened to me with my WIP. I was reading it for entertainment and was like, "Wow, that's really interesting. What is this lady gonna do about that." Well, the lady was me.

Hee hee. I know that feeling.

Sohia Rose said:
Then I read it a few weeks later, editing it for the sixth time, and I was like, "This stinks! No one's gonna like this crap!"

Yeah, I know that feeling, too.

Aren't writers fun to be around?

johnzakour · Jan 15, 2007

I think it's a good sign. After all writers are readers too. I always say if you like your writing chances are good others will too.

TrainofThought · Jan 15, 2007

Never happened to me with my WIP. I've read books where I rewrote the characters, changed the plot, or compared it to my writing. I feel left out now. :Shrug:

PeeDee · Jan 15, 2007

Sometimes, I get something similar mid-story. I'll sit back and just stare at the screen, or the paper, because there's something there that didn't exist thirty seconds earlier. I don't know where it came from. I don't know where it's going. It could destroy the story for all I know.

Once, I had a really great idea for a short story. It had a title, a character or two, an ending, and I loved it. I wrote it in an evening, a gift from the gods. Then, the next morning, I sifted through a box of old story drafts I had....and realized I had just retyped, nearly word perfect, a story I'd written and forgotten about two years earlier.

TheIT · Jan 16, 2007

Good, I'm not the only one. I've repeated scenes in my first draft. Also, once when I was switching between projects I misplaced the original notebook for my current WIP and started a new notebook. When I came across the original notebook, I discovered I had recreated many of my original ideas. I figure anything I've come up with twice must have some staying power.

Stew21 · Jan 16, 2007

I catch myself every so often, anxious and excited to find out what happens next in the story, only to realize that in order to find out, I have to write it. so yes, I've treated it many times like I am the reader, "ooh, can't wait to find out what happens to these characters! hey wait, I get to write it!"

Freckles · Jan 16, 2007

It is nice to just read your WIP for the sheer enjoyment factor sometimes. I like silence the editor -- sometimes I have to bang it over the head with a gavel before it'll shut up -- in me from time to time.

I should try that with my new stuff...maybe better ideas will flow then!

WildScribe · Jan 16, 2007

LOL, me too. Latest scene: character has to be away from home so that she doesn't run into her boyfriend.

Okay... take a bus to downtown for the day? Now what. She's wandered around... eaten lunch and dinner... Oh, at dinner she overhears two people at the next table talking about an event. She asks them about it. They invite her to join. Hey, my character made two random new friends.

That's pretty much how my writing goes. I have no idea what is going to happen until it happens.

Shadow_Ferret · Jan 16, 2007

I feel that way everything I revisit a piece that I haven't read in a long time. I forget that I wrote it and I think, "Hey, this crap isn't half bad."

It's actually happening to me now as I read through my printed manuscript for my WIP. On occassion I get caught up in the story and forget I'm supposed to be looking at it with a critical eye.

But then there's always something jarring in it and I go, "WTF was the writer thinking? Oh. Wait. That's me."

AnneMarble · Jan 16, 2007

Shadow_Ferret said:
I feel that way everything I revisit a piece that I haven't read in a long time. I forget that I wrote it and I think, "Hey, this crap isn't half bad."

Often followed by "Hey, if I combine this story with the one about the man who sees purple unicorns in his garden...

Somewhere, I still have most of my old notebooks of ideas, including the first one. (To give you an idea of how old the first one is, it's an Empire Strikes Back notebook.

) Now and then, I'll look at these old notebooks and say "Hmmm." (I ended up having to start one notebook just to review those notebooks and write down ideas that I most wanted to go back to.)

Shadow_Ferret said:
But then there's always something jarring in it and I go, "WTF was the writer thinking? Oh. Wait. That's me."

In my first notebook, there's an idea that I crossed out furiously. I wrote something next to this like "This idea was stupid!!!"

Stew21 · Jan 16, 2007

WildScribe said:
LOL, me too. Latest scene: character has to be away from home so that she doesn't run into her boyfriend.

Okay... take a bus to downtown for the day? Now what. She's wandered around... eaten lunch and dinner... Oh, at dinner she overhears two people at the next table talking about an event. She asks them about it. They invite her to join. Hey, my character made two random new friends.

That's pretty much how my writing goes. I have no idea what is going to happen until it happens.

some of my best character sprang up from moments like this one you described. I have a character in my most recent novel that I didn't know was going to be there, but he was so charismatic, and wonderful and provided fantastic info to my MC. This old guy was just perfect to be there at the time and I was delighted when he came into it. I didn't think of him before I wrote the words, he just sort of "appeared" in the words and I am just so pleased with him. I love those little surprises.

jodiodi · Jan 16, 2007

I had a character come to life on her own as well. She was just supposed to be someone the MC meets as she's passing through town; good for a few decent scenes while we wait for the hero to return from his mysterious mission. She seemed to strike a chord with me and when people read the story, they kept asking about her. Turns out she's had major roles in 3 more of the books I've done.

Now and then I read my stuff just to see what it's doing after a long time away and I'll say, "Man, that was really good." I love when that happens.

Then I let people with critical editor eyes look at it and I'm immediately deflated.

Out-of-WIP Experiences

AnneMarble

Nefarious Ghost Fan

KTC

Stand in the Place Where You Live

Sohia Rose

Will write for coffee

greglondon

Planet Wookie techno geek

AnneMarble

Nefarious Ghost Fan

johnzakour

Dangerous with a Keyboard

TrainofThought

A flowering bud of bitchiness

PeeDee

Where's my tea, please...?

TheIT

Infuriatingly Theoretical

Stew21

Freckles

Oooh, the Rainbow Connection

WildScribe

Slave to the Wordcount

Shadow_Ferret

Court Jester

AnneMarble

Nefarious Ghost Fan

Stew21

jodiodi

Reflections of Reality