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Earlier today I tweeted, "I hate when I'm working on a WIP & another idea creeps up & won't go away, because it sounds super awesome. What do you do???" I received a slew of responses, and thought I'd ask ya'll the same question, because it is something I struggle with often, and it appears other writers do too. One response suggested going with the idea until you can't write anymore, and then shelve it, but this could lead to abandoning the current project to work on the new idea. I'm thinking the best option is to write down a few notes, and have the discipline to set it aside. What does the Book Country community think?
Also, this means your folders could become cluttered with story fragments, so another question is how do you keep all these pieces organized? I have a story starter folder saved on my hard drive, but do you do anything else to keep your ideas organized?
Final question on this topic, after you have finished a project, how do you decide which one to start working on next?
--edited by Toni Smalley on 8/8/2013, 9:40 PM--
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Joined: 2/9/2012
Posts: 427
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These are all good, important question, Toni.
Toni Smalley wrote:I'm thinking the best option is to write down a few notes, and have the discipline to set it aside. What does the Book Country community think?
I agree with you on that. Following through on a project is super important. If a writer only writes openings of novels, how will he or she ever learn about the plight of the sagging middle or the difficulty of charting the protagonist's psychological and actual progress in the book? I guess it's easier said than done, though!
I'm curious, how hard is it for you to overcome the temptation to abandon the old stuff and plunge into a brand-new project?
--edited by Nevena Georgieva on 8/19/2013, 11:00 AM--
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Toni Smalley wrote:Earlier today I tweeted, "I hate when I'm working on a WIP & another idea creeps up & won't go away, because it sounds super awesome. What do you do???"
The problem isn't with getting great new ideas. It's that you're not really into the one you're trying to write. If it was real to you, and you were deep in the head of the protagonist, you wouldn't be thinking of other plots, or even want to, other than to say, "Hey, that could work. I'll jot it down for later."
The sad truth is that story idea are easy. Any decent writer can pop them off as fast as you can write them down. But readers aren't interested in great story ideas. They don't get to view them at once as you do. They experience them one moment at a time. So they're looking for moment-to-moment reading enjoyment, which comes from the writing skills of the author, not great plot ideas.
I mean no insult by this, but it's been my experience that when people face the problem you mentioned, they're not writing, they're daydreaming themselves into the situation. But because they haven't a deep knowledge of things like what a scene is on the page (it's not the same as on stage or screen), the elements that make it up, and how scene leads to scene, always growing in excitement, they don't know how to present their story on the page. Because the printed word lacks picture and sound we can't just list the events in that scene we dream up, we need to translate it into a form that works on the page. But we can't, because all we know when we come to writing is the general skill called writing that we were given in our basic education—the nonfiction skills required by our future employers.
Lacking the specialized knowledge required for creating fiction for the printed word, when the writer attempts to take that exciting scene and place it on the page it hasn't the excitement it held when it was something they were watching on the viewscreen of imagination. So they get bored and lose interest. And bang, another idea pops in and they're daydreaming themself into the new scene, filled with excitement again...until they try to put it on the page.
The solution is to dig into the craft of the fiction writer, so you have the tools needed to translate the images in your head into a form that places them into the reader's head, intact. Never forget that out goal isn't to inform. It's to entertain. And that takes an entirely different set of craft.
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Joined: 3/16/2011
Posts: 279
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All of the established authors I've known deal with this. One insists that you need three projects going at any given time. One in edits, one in second draft and the last just beginning. One author I know keeps a board in his office where he jots down all the ideas he gets mid-manuscript and sometimes incorporates them into a current WIP. If he doesn't the ideas are still there in front of his face and not buried on a word document somewhere. There is no wrong way unless you stop and never finish a single project.
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Joined: 2/9/2012
Posts: 427
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Now I'm curious--how many projects are you guys working on at the moment? Is there a project you abandoned but came back to later?
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Joined: 3/16/2011
Posts: 279
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I write for several country music industry sources as part of my day job so I can have several word documents open at any given time. Like everything in life, writers need to prioritize and stay focused. As for manuscripts, I have several completed first drafts stockpiled. I decided SALEM was the best of the lot so I'm polishing it, doing revisions and so on before sending it out into the world. Next on my publishing schedule is Nowhere to Run (Formally Bon Voyage). There's a title I posted on Book Country called Roughing It that is a single chapter I wrote on the plane two years ago. I haven't touched it since. I have another 100k word unnamed fantasy manuscript that's a first draft and I haven't done any revisions on because it was my first completed book and I like keeping that one for myself. ONE NIGHT IN NASHVILLE I put on hold pending the sale of some of the songs that I wrote into the book that now have to be removed. I can live with that revision. 
I've been writing for a couple years and it's only now I feel ready to take the next step.
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Sorry, for just responding! I was gone for a few weeks for my sister's wedding, then vacation (and, I'm not allowed working or getting social online when vacation is in progress...not my rule).
@Nevena: I agree with your view on following through, but, yes, it's easier said than done, lol! How hard is it to overcome temptation to abandon a project? Suppose it depends on how excited I am about the new idea. I have been super-excited three times (1st it was Glengoreth, next Smoke & Needles, then Lissmore City). I get frustrated with one, I start working on a short story to take a break. My frustration is usually due to feeling overwhelmed and not knowing where to go next with the story.
@Danielle: I definitely never stop, lol! I just never finish. I like the three projects going at once idea. I'm where you are. I have been writing for years, and decided to take the next step and try to finish my stories for publication. Country music? That's exciting! I listen to mostly classic rock and country 
@Nevena: I have four main WIPS. When I'm frustrated with one, I let it simmer for awhile as I work on another: WIP 1 - The Glengoreth Treasure Series: Book 1 - 37,541 words (1st draft is almost to ½-way point…I think); Book 2 - 17,277 words; Book 3 - 24,632 words. WIP 2 - Lissmore City Series: Book 1: 19,183 words (1st draft …re-conceptualization in progress). WIP 3 - Smoke & Needles (novella): 20,863 words (3rd draft, my first WIP almost done! Working on this one right now). WIP 4 - Planet Nonsense, Coffin Corner, & The Fantasy Train (short story collection): about 42,000 words (1st draft is 2/3 complete)
I also have about five main short stories ranging from 3,000 to 7,000 words complete on each. These are the ones I work on when I need a break from my main WIPs. My starter idea folder has about 40 ideas with a few hundred words started for each (mostly for short stories, a few novel ideas), but half of it is crap, the other half might have potential. That's how I deal with the ideas that pop up. Usually, I'll write a few pages, and then just take down notes on plot and scene ideas.
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Jay Greenstein wrote:But because they haven't a deep knowledge of things like what a scene is on the page (it's not the same as on stage or screen), the elements that make it up, and how scene leads to scene, always growing in excitement, they don't know how to present their story on the page. Because the printed word lacks picture and sound we can't just list the events in that scene we dream up, we need to translate it into a form that works on the page. But we can't, because all we know when we come to writing is the general skill called writing that we were given in our basic education—the nonfiction skills required by our future employers.
Having studied film in college, I am aware of how scene progression works. I am more familiar with expressing a story on screen than on paper, so I agree that scriptwriting is very different from novel writing. I have no problem creating a timeline of scenes, which is what I usually do. For one of my main WIPS, The Glengoreth Treasure series, I have book one's timeline complete in Excel, creating titles for each scene accompanied with brief descriptions. I just have to finish writing the first draft. I recently discovered Scrivener, which I wish I would have found sooner. Organization is one of my pitfalls which often is the cause of my frustration. I wrote Smoke and Needles with Scrivener without the need for creating a scene outline in Excel, and I was able to complete the first draft much faster than I thought I could. Anyway, yes, the screen and the novel are very different. I think my film studies have helped in creating overall scenes, it is just a difference in how the scene is expressed.
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Joined: 6/7/2013
Posts: 1356
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@Toni--I've been hearing such great things abt Scrivener. I think I read in the NYT that Gretchen Rubin, who wrote THE HAPPINESS PROJECT books, uses it, and another friend of mine working on a super complicated novel from lots of POVs, also swears by it.
@Nevena can attest that I am obsessed with figuring out organizational strategies for keeping track of ideas. But mostly I just keep running lists in the cloud, so that I can access them anywhere.
As for your original post, I am not sure what the best strategy is. The monogamist in me tells me to stay faithful to a project until it's done. In writing, that's usually what I do.
But I am also a knitter, and I always, always have multiple WIPs going. You gotta have one that's small enough to take in your bag, for when you get stuck waiting at the doctor's office. You gotta have one that's super easy to do while you're watching TV. You gotta have another one that's challenging and frustrating, but engages your mind. Another one should be creative, as in--you make it up as you go, rather than using a pattern, and learn how to visualize things and then bring them into being.
That's one reason I think writers should have a blog and be on social media, and not just to promote their books. I actually think having these different "genres" of writing gives our brains little workouts. A blog post provides a short break from the novel; a Tweet is an exercise in brevity. It sometimes requires a little discomfort to adjust and readjust, but I think that if you feel a pull toward a new idea, follow it through for an hour or so, see where it takes you. Taking a day or two to draft a short story or a chapter of a whole other novel might make the WIP come more slowly in terms of daily word count, but that shift could be just what you needed to do for the WIP to get finished at all. You could come back to it with fresh eyes, or simply with better concentration once you get something out of your system.
Sometimes I think your brain wants to have a little adventure every once in a while, and we should be nice to our brains and keep them happy, since they do so much for us!
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Lucy Silag wrote:
Sometimes I think your brain wants to have a little adventure every once in a while, and we should be nice to our brains and keep them happy, since they do so much for us!
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Joined: 6/7/2013
Posts: 1356
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@Toni--no prob! I do love to share my perspective . . . LOL.
Love hearing what other writers are thinking about! Makes me feel less nutty. Keep these discussions coming--I think we have a lot of tips for each other!
Lucy
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I'm a chronic project-jumper - not for its own sake, though, and not at random. Sometimes it comes in handy - if I'm stuck on one novel, and I have ideas for another one in progress, it saves time to work on the one I have an idea for. By switching back and forth, I'm probably saving lots of time, as opposed to losing that time if I were to merely work on one at a time and that would be that, even if I was stuck on that one.
It does become problematic, however, when brand-new ideas for novels start to drop in and pull up a chair...
--edited by Ian Nathaniel Cohen on 9/15/2013, 6:37 PM--
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@Ian: Yep, I'm definitely with you on the project jumping! We are all wired differently, and I understand those who focus on one project at a time, which makes sense. I wish I could do that, but my brain doesn't work like that lol!
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Joined: 6/7/2013
Posts: 1356
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Haha, @Ian--funny mental image of all those ideas forming a circle around me at the desk, each wanting attention.
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Toni: Maybe when an idea pops up while writing something else you are being given not an unrelated substance but something integral to your current project. Dashing off a synopsis of the eager interloper might serve to keep it at bay. At any rate, once we are focused on a demanding project we must have the discipline not to become distracted by a new idea knocking on the door.
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Jay: I don't think writers of fiction should have goals or exist to entertain readers. Whatever I have written is the result of a compulsion to "get it down." Perhaps plot line might be considered a goal of sorts, but fulfilling the mandates of plot should never preclude the serendipitous arrival of a new idea. And while these discussions among ourselves are refreshing and often enlightening, we should never fall into the trap of trying to please each other, nor neglect the lone wolf aspect of writing. At day's end we face alone the terrifying prospect of filling naked pages with words that have the charm to entertain and the power to inform and, perhaps, the overpowering energy to move mountains. Thomas Wolfe wrote often of the joyful/sorrowful man, a bittersweet description of anyone daring to dip the pen and pound the keys. Since I don't write for a particular genre or to entertain, I'll settle for an occasional rattling of the pillars of the earth.
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