Trying to tell the story

My writing has been progressing very slowly recently. It’s been a combination of busyness, anxiety and apathy – really not a pleasant brew. At times there have been so many things going on that I have simply decided to do nothing, which is less than constructive. After a day of tradespeople, school-related things, scouts, music lessons, household maintenance and the imminent destruction of life as we know it (the trials of children, well actually all our trials, are very real to us), the last thing I want to do is to sit down and write. Chocolate and a book or the newspaper or talking to Mr. Blithe or even television all seem more appealing.

One of the things I’ve been thinking about is writing style. I’ve always approached the writing of fiction in a linear way. That is, trying to tell a story as a coherent narrative: A talked to B then C happened and the result was D. Part of this is natural inclination. Part is my academic training and if I can include some footnotes, all the better!

But if I think about what I have written in the last few months, it has mostly been vignettes: little snippets of thoughts and stories written down for Two Tree Hill. Many days I find it hard to write (although I always want to), but I can usually find a few moments to jot down some ideas. So I’m going to try to use that approach in my novel. I want to see if by jotting down snippets of the story I can somehow make my way towards the cohesive whole. It’s got to be better than apathy.