As a writer, I have found that one of the most versatile (and portable) sources of writing prompts is a set of dice.  There are many writing games you can play with a die and they can help bust through writing blocks.  Here are a few games that work for me.

Writing by Numbers
Roll the die and multiply the number by 10.  That is the number of minutes you have to write.  Do not stop writing.  Keep your hand moving.  If you find yourself getting distracted, bring yourself back and keep writing.  Subject doesn’t matter; what’s important is that you’re writing.  You can do a similar exercise where the number on the die indicates the number of pages you need to fill in your writing session. 

Tip: Writing by hand often helps kill the inner critic.  After all, it’s OK to be messy while scribbling in a journal.

6 Questions
Roll the die.

1=Who?   2=What?   3=When?   4=Where?  5=Why?   6=How?

Use the question to investigate a character from a current project.  Push the question as far as it will go.  For example, if you rolled 1, you might ask “Who is this character?”  “Who is he at the core?”  “Who is he to his friends?”  “His enemies?”

Point of View
Roll the die to determine which POV to write in.

1 = 1st person
2 = 2nd person
3 = 3rd person limited
4 = 3rd person multiple
5 = omniscient
6 = wild card*

*For wild card, choose any other point of view not listed above.  If you’re not sure what the options are, you can find more info on POV in this post.

Roll the die again.
odd # = present tense
even # = past tense

There’s something freeing about leaving some element of one’s writing up to chance.  It’s as though all the responsibility is no longer just in the writer’s hands.  By making your writing time into a game of chance, it can help strip away some of the anxiety or perfectionism which often haunts many writers.

It’s January and the new semester is starting soon.  That said, iggi and I have decided to bring back DIY MFA, to help you all get your writing resolutions under way!  (New to the blog or not sure what DIY MFA is?  Just check the iggi U tab at the top of the page to learn all about it.)

We’re making a few tiny changes.  There’s still TONS I could say about literature, craft, and creativity, so I will continue posting articles on those topics.  Since community and the workshop are more about going out and actually experiencing these things, there’s only so much I can tell you before you have to jump in and try it for yourself.  I won’t be posting as regularly on these two subjects, but will bring them back when something important or relevant comes up.  Also since my passion is writing Middle Grade and Teen literature, I’ll be doing more posts specifically targeting that genre.

So, what does this mean for DIY MFA?

Monday:  Love of Literature  (i.e. Everything reading-related.)
Tuesday:  Wild Card day 
Wednesday:  Craftivity  (i.e. All about the craft of writing.)
Thursday:  Brain Boot Camp (i.e. Tips about creativity, writing prompts, ideas for exercises.  Basically, everything you need to exercise your writing brain.)
Friday:  This one’s going to be a collaborative project and I plan to unveil it this coming Friday.

What do you have to do to be part of the fun?  Just read the topics you want to follow and comment if you feel like it.  Also, please sign up to be part of the iggi&gabi email list!  You won’t get spam and you’ll be in the loop if DIY MFA news comes up.  In September, I contacted readers on the list to ask for volunteers to guest post or help out with the DIY MFA community.

Sooner or later, writers have to put their writing into context.  This means tracking down published books that are similar to the WIP (i.e. competitive books) and reading them.  Some writers like to do this sort of research as they’re working on their own book.  Other writers prefer to hold off until they’ve been through a draft or two.  Regardless of when you decide to start doing your research, it’s going to take time.  And that’s time you won’t be spending writing, or revising, or querying, or… you get the picture.

Which brings me to the point of this post.  How do we actually find these elusive books in the first place?  And for that matter, how do we keep our reading lists from getting long and out of control?  I’m a perfect example of the latter.  Every time I hear of a book even remotely similar to my WIP, I have run out and read it.  This is all well and good, but it does nothing to get my actual WIP written in the first place.  The message here is to find a balance.  Yes, research is important, but the key is to do it efficiently and effectively.

To that end, here’s a nifty trick I’ve discovered that has helped me speed up the search for competitive books.  All you need is the internet and the title of (at least) one competitive book.

1) Go to Amazon.com and search for that one competitive book you’ve already found.   If you don’t have the title of at least one book that’s similar to your WIP, try doing a keyword search.  All you need is to find one book and then the search becomes much easier.

2) Scroll down to where it says “Customers who bought this book also bought…”  Browse through the books listed and make a note of any that might fit within the context of your WIP (similar themes, genre, target audience, etc.)

3) Use the “Look Inside” feature on Amazon or search for the titles you’ve noted using Google books.  Read a few pages.  An alternative is to go to a bookstore or library with your list and browse the shelves.  After all, you want to make sure the books you’ve put on your list are actually going to be useful.

4) Now read ’em.

This trick might seem like a no-brainer to all you super-efficient genius researchers out there, but believe it or not it took me forever to figure out.  In case anyone else out there has been beating their heads against the wall (like I did for so long) I figured I’d pass on this trick.  Sure, this search tool isn’t foolproof and nothing beats the tried-and-true method of getting recommendations from a librarian or knowledgeable bookseller.  But in a pinch, this saves time.  And as I see it, that just means more time for writing.

On a separate note: Don’t forget to check out my contest!  It’s open until Saturday.

Sometimes in life all you can do is wait.  Wait for good news.  Or bad news.  Or any news at all.  But regardless, you’re waiting.

It drives me crazy sometimes because when I want to know something, I want to know NOW, and everything else just feels like passing the time.

Writers know what it’s like to wait.  You send a story out and then you wait.  You send a batch of queries and you wait.  You send your piece to a critique group and you wait.  And all the while, it feels like the writing process gets suspended in time, just waiting.

It’s like this with the act of writing too.  Some stories just aren’t ready to gush out as quickly as you would like.  Some books need time to ripen before you harvest them and put them on the page.  You can’t always beat stories out of your brain with a stick; it just doesn’t work that way.

Of course, we’ve all heard writers say that you can’t wait around for inspiration, because writing is about BIC (butt in chair) and not just that glimmer of an idea.  And I agree, in theory.  But I also believe that writing is about balance and about recognizing when one idea needs time to lie low and when you need to work on something else for a change.

I call this Active Procrastination, a trick I perfected in college.  It works like this: when faced with a lot of tasks, some of which you’re just not ready to deal with right now, you pick an easy and harmless task to do first.  Like watching a movie for your film class before starting on the scary research paper.  You’re still getting stuff done, but you’re letting your brain rest until you’re ready to tackle the big things.

Lately I’ve had some big stuff on my plate, some of which I’ve had to be dealt with quickly because it was time-sensitive and this has totally discombobulated my writing practice.  Now I’m waiting.  Not for something relating to my writing but for someone central to my life.  And the minutes can’t tick by fast enough.  In the meantime, I’m trying to read or write or do anything to pass the time.

Tick, tock, tick, tock.

What about you?  What do you do to make the waiting part of the writing process more bearable?