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A few of my writing friends recently pointed out how well I maintain my writing. They said I “keep at it,” and I guess I do. I write most days, but I told them I haven’t always been this way, because I haven’t. I do write a lot now, but there have been periods in my life where that wasn’t the case. I’d go days with struggling. Or months. Or, sometimes, years. After writing for close to three decades, I’m going to share with you what has worked for me when I’ve found myself in an uncomfortable hole, and when I’m feeling not myself because I'm not writing. While some of my ideas might seem basic and common (although I’ll actually tell you how and why to do them), many of the ideas on this list will be new ideas that offer an action plan. They should inspire you, because these will be the things you want to write about, even if you don’t know it yet. 6 Ways to Handle Writer's Block
5. Just do it Okay, so I will steal this one from other articles. But I’ll give you some concrete ways to ‘just do it’, even when you don’t feel like you can. When I realized how much of myself I was missing by not reading or writing for a few years, I decided that it had to change. I needed to write, and regularly. So I challenged myself – to write one flash fiction piece a week. This number was manageable. I could write 1,000 words or less in a week (although it did take time to figure out how to write flash fiction – I had to learn what to focus on in a story since I could *only* write ~1,000 words!). 1. So when I tell you to “just do it”, I also first tell you to give yourself a required word count/limit. This can be flash fiction at around 1,000 words per week, or it might even be less, at 500 words per week. Up to you and your schedule. 2. Then, second, if you’re still struggling with what to write about, I tell you to ask for help. If you’re not sure what to write about – ask other people. This might mean specific story prompts (from the internet, from friends), or it might mean words (I hate plot prompts – they never align with my style, so I find it so hard to use them. I like words. I ask people to offer me word they like, and then I write a story inspired by that one word). Then commit to it. I used to attend a writer’s meetup on Wednesday nights for a year. It was at a Panera Bread restaurant, and I just went and sat by myself and wrote for a few hours and knocked out my once-a-week flash fiction piece. After having not written for a few years, this is what got me back into writing. Having the outside location and other people there with the intent to write really helped me focus. It may have been more difficult to do at home when I was already struggling with writer’s block. 4. Give yourself an audience I wrote a ton when back in high school, because I had friends reading it. I was also posting on websites like Fanfiction or Wattpad. Then I graduated from high school, grew distant from those friends, and stopped posting on sites. I wrote less. When I went back to school for my third degree (Creative Writing), my classes' workshops gave me an audience which reignited my desire to write. Having people I am writing for or who intend on reading has always been helpful for me. Examples Giving yourself an audience can look like finding friends who write and workshopping with them, or finding an online community through social media. It can look like using the workshop’s deadlines to motivate yourself. It can look like using your friends to bounce ideas off of – it doesn’t have to be after you’ve written. When you’ve got writer’s block and aren’t sure where to go, it can be helpful to throw the idea out there and have a friend give you an idea on where to take it that you haven’t already thought of. If you haven’t already, consider joining a Facebook group for writers to start building that community for yourself. Here are some I'm in: 3. Pay attention to everything This includes the notes scribbled on bathroom walls. The Santa Clause figurine inside someone’s open garage. The word that you think is beautiful in the book you’re reading. The misheard song lyric that you think is genius – why did someone else write it and you didn’t? And then you find out that they didn’t write it because they wrote something else and you heard it wrong… so, score! Now it’s yours! That weird conversation you have with your partner on the way out the door. The thing you read in the news that sounded wild and you can’t believe someone did that in real life. All of this is gold. The thing is, most experiences are not completely original. Besides, you can always change some things to make it new, but these experiences give a great place to start when wanting to write very specific details that help build characters or scenes. Examples On my walk today I saw two little girls in cowboy hats playing on the sidewalk with chalk. I’d have never of thought of this on my own, but how interesting. I saw them and immediately came up with character ideas and plot ideas. If I wanted to change it further to make it less specific to that person, maybe it’s one girl. Maybe she’s not playing with chalk but bubbles. Whatever. It’s a good starting point. Even George Saunders used something he noticed in his neighborhood to inspire a story. See the story and his comment about the house he noticed and wrote about here. Most of my stories and characters are a Frankenstein’s monster- they are usually never completely imagined, but also never based solely on one person or experience. Typically, they are made up of some imagination as well as many little people and experiences I’ve met or had in my life. 2. Internet Forums Seriously. Whenever I need any kind of inspiration or information on a topic that I have not personally experienced, places like Reddit or other internet forums are the jackpot. People discuss all sorts of experiences they’ve had on there, which can help when trying to incorporate experiences into your own writing that you haven’t had yourself. Example I wanted an experience with fire because I was writing a scene where I wanted fire to be a symbol. I am not a firefighter, no real experience with it, but a whole bunch of people on Reddit have had an experience, and people on Reddit like to talk about their experiences. I Googled "Weird Fire Story Reddit", and on one post, a few people talked about how the smell of bodies in a crematory smell like steak or burgers being cooked. This gave me something new to write about that I otherwise would have been stuck on. Then the thing that helps me most of all is: 1. Making a document (dun dun dun) Seriously, this might feel anticlimactic, but the biggest thing that has helped me write regularly has been a Google Doc that I created. Whenever I have any type of thing that inspires me (title ideas based off something I heard someone say at the gym, details I noticed on my walk, character ideas because of the person I saw sitting in the car next to me, etc. – really anything you paid attention to up in number 4) I list them in this document. This document has been my writing life saver. When I was working on my creative writing degree and had to write regularly for workshops, I needed many things to write about. I don’t always have things to write about though, and my memory is very bad, so when I had an idea at one point, it’s gone now and I’ve got nothing. This is why this list is great. All the ideas I have had are listed in one place, and if I want to write, I already have the things that inspire me right there. I don't have to wait for inspiration! My Google Doc’s list includes the following categories:
Honestly, this document has been my writing savior because when I want to write but don’t know what to write about, I have a treasure chest of ideas right in front of me. Ideas that I came up with. Things that inspire me. Things I want to write about anyway, so why not do it now? So start your document today, and keep adding to it. Seriously. Then in the future, whenever you want to write something, you'll have a list of ideas. Because writer’s block, to me, is the inability to write. Not knowing what to write about, even if I want to. If that’s what it’s like for you, you don’t need to worry about that anymore! They say that luck is when preparation meets opportunity. That’s how I view writing. I practice. I observe. I read. I learn things from other people. I practice more. I keep this list. And when I struggle with writing and don’t know what to write about, I have my preparation (the list) and opportunity (the desire or need to write), so I just sit down and make it happen. And that’s it. That’s my writing magic. I cheat. I make my own luck and kick writer’s block out of the way. And, surprise, two (simple) bonus ways that have helped me manage writer’s block:
Go for a walk This isn’t original. I’ve seen it on other lists. It probably doesn’t sound especially helpful, right? What does moving your legs have to do with writing? Walking can actually be very helpful, but only if you’ve honed in on observing. Meditating isn’t useful if you don’t know how to do it, right? Same goes for walking. But once you’ve trained yourself to pay attention to everything, it’s one of the best ways to get ideas to add to your list. There are so many interesting details to notice in the world. I also find that when I’m away from distractions and technology, my mind pays attention to those details and thinks a lot of things about them – so I immediately add those thoughts to my list! So get up right now, go on a walk, and notice strange things about your neighborhood's houses, or about someone you pass. Walk down a main road and look at the shops or people driving. Examples There’s construction happening on the main road by my house. I pass it every day on my walk. For a few weeks I noticed the crew had some coolers that they just left on the side of the road that said Do Not Open. I don’t know what story this belongs in yet, but it’s such an interesting detail that it belongs somewhere. So it gets added to my list, and then one day, when I’m trying to figure out what to write, I’ll see that and decide it fits, and it’ll find a home. (The construction guys also left a bottle of Mountain Dew out for a few days. Another strange detail that will get added into some story eventually). Eliminating the need for the perfect story This isn’t for everyone, but this is the final thing that has helped me with writer’s block, especially when tackling a longer story like a novel (which I was never before able to finish). What I mean by that is: I’m indecisive. Picking one plot that gets developed, and having one ending that’s the best… puts a lot of pressure on me, and I struggle with that, because I’m just not a decisive person. So when I decided to write an interactive novel (that I will eventually blog about), I was given so much freedom to be more creative and write shorter, choppier things, but still develop it way more than a short story gets to experience. I was also able to play with four endings. By giving myself this freedom, I felt like I could write about a lot of different things without them having to fit in the way a normal novel would need them to fit. Writing helps. Moving helps. I think more when there’s nothing in front of me and I’m moving and only have my own head to live in. So go on a walk, go to the gym, and figure out ideas you can add to your list that way. I almost never write about my ideas immediately. They get added to my list. It has to be the right time, where I’ve figured out what these ideas mean to me, or have come up with some other idea that it connects to it really well and can be combined. Then I can work its magic. Do you have anything that's worked for you that I missed? Let me know below. PREFACE: If this is your first trip to my blog, I write a lot of transgressive fiction and my blog posts are resources for other transgressive writers. I offer book reviews, transgressive topics for inspiration, research on social change, and creative writing techniques. The article below discusses some ideas for creative writing. Welcome! A villanelle is a very structured poem made up of nineteen lines, with five tercets (three-line stanzas) followed by one quatrain (four-line stanza). Additionally, many poets use iambic pentameter (which is when a line has five sets of unstressed and stressed syllables. Each line then has a total of 10 total syllables). LitCharts provides further information and an example: “Jean Passerat's poem "Villanelle (I lost my turtledove)," [is] the first fixed-form villanelle ever written. The formal aspects of the villanelle are highlighted: the first line of the poem is repeated as a refrain at the end of the second and fourth tercets; the third line is repeated at the end of the third and fifth tercets.” For those that are more visually inclined, this is what the villanelle looks like (all the lines with A must rhyme, and all the lines with B must rhyme. Additionally, the first lines repeat as lines 6, 12, and 18 as noted by the asterisk below. Line 3 repeats and lines 9, 15, and 19 as noted by the caret below.): A * B A ^ A B A * A B A ^ A B A * A B A ^ A B A * A ^ It’s literally the same two sounds happening over and over, and two lines that get repeated multiple times. ![]() Taken from Poetry through the Ages I learned of the villanelle poem and challenged myself to write a poem in that form (which is, in fact, pretty challenging). Although I did it, and am pretty happy with it (for what it's worth), I’m not the biggest fan of writing form poetry. I'm a free verse kind of woman. I do, however, love thinking about how to apply unique form to fiction. This led me to consider the villanelle’s use of repetition in my fiction writing. I obviously wasn’t planning on rhyming or iambic pentameter-ing my story, but I could repeat an idea, or a line, instead. This forced me to consider what kind of story would be best suited to include constant repetition. Like I mention in my article “Stalking Women: Transgressive Fiction Topics” that I wrote last week, I stumbled across a docuseries on stalking that gave me an a-hah moment. Stalking is obsessive… and repetitive… this form would perfectly lend itself to the obsessive behavior a stalker has. Repeating ideas over and over and over. So I did some research on stalkers – specifically female stalkers – and after better understand who my character might realistically be, I started to plan my own fictional villanelle. This is the outline I came up with: Villanelle Form Outline A* I used to live on the tenth floor – (of the Watterson towers). B I saw you in class - you talked about the importance of words. A^ I want to see you again. A My unfriendly roommate (roommate starts conversation about mom dying and boyfriend leaving). B My window faced West. A* I used to live on the tenth floor. A Last day of class. B Thought about missing him - 'Part of me wishes I hadn't passed my test, because I would have got to spend more time with you'. A^ I want to see you again - email him. A Show boyfriend breaking up - spiral downward. B It was small, but from the tower I could see your classroom across campus. A* I used to live on the tenth floor. A You didn't answer your email that night, so sent another in the morning, two more that afternoon, and three more that night. Why are you not answering? B I found your number on the internet - and so I called. Needed to hear your voice to fall asleep. Left a voicemail. Each night for seven days - didn't sleep for a week. A^ I want to see you again. A Now I’m in my car - next to your building on campus - it's easier to see this way. It's west, but it was far. B I showed up at your house first, and threw a rock at your window - but you weren't home. Window cracked. A* I used to live on the tenth floor, but now I'm in a car waiting for you. A^ I want to see you again. Based on my research, my character was less likely to stalk a stranger, so it should be someone she knows. She was motivated by a desire to having a more intimate relationship with someone who is older. I decided to make the person she was stalking a professional who she desired being closer with after she experienced great loss in two areas of her life. On any given day, whenever I come up with story ideas, I write them in a document (I will write about this on the blog soon.) One of my random line ideas I had in this document was “I used to live on the tenth floor” which, as I was looking through the document for inspiration, I decided would be a focal point for the narrator. I also decided that part of the repetition had to be from her obsession, so “I want to see you again” became the other chorus. In traditional poetry, all the As would rhyme and Bs would rhyme. There’s nothing ‘rhyming’ about the other lines, but instead they are just scenes that help develop the story. While a different kind of difficulty, this project definitely challenged me like when I was writing the villanelle poem. These very specific parameters to write this story under forced me to be very intentional about how I structured this plot. If you're interested in working with this form for a fiction story specifically:
"I Used to Live on the Tenth Floor" is the draft I ended up writing. It was a fun exercise and I encourage you to try playing with this, or any form. Are there any unique or experimental forms you have tried? Anything you’re interested in playing with? PREFACE: If this is your first trip to my blog, I write a lot of transgressive fiction and my blog posts are resources for other transgressive writers. I offer book reviews, transgressive topics for inspiration, research on social change, and creative writing techniques. The writing below is a short story I wrote. In the following weeks, I will post an article about stalking and then an article about this story’s form. Welcome! I used to live on the tenth floor. It isn’t the highest floor of the Watterson Towers because the building is actually twenty-eight stories high, but it’s still pretty high. High enough. It overlooks a lot of campus, but I didn’t realize how important that was until recently when I lost everything.
The first time I saw you was the first day of class, Intro to Psych. You had a terrific laugh. You had slick hair, round glasses, and a suit coat that fit you like it was a tailored Armani. Man, do I like tailored suits. You said to us that psychology was important, even if we never became doctors, because it explained people, and why people do the things they do. People are interesting. You paced the floors, talked with your hands. I sat in the fifth row of the lecture hall and that was the last time I sat that far back. You talked about words. We each speak thousands of words a day and many of us slip. Our words spill, they bend, they are messy. We say things we don’t mean. We grab words, and we have to do it so quickly that sometimes we grab the words right next to the correct one. We say things we think. We say things we don’t mean to say. One experiment showed that people who had first read the phrase “damp rifle” later said “wet gun” instead of “get one.” I watched your shoulders slump, your throat sigh. I watched the corners of your lips reach up. I wanted to see you again. My roommate stole my book last week. She stole it once before, but I found it. Underneath clothes of mine that she also took and threw on her closet floor. She thought she could take them since I’d flagged them as a soon-to-be thrift store donation. So she took them. The book though, there was no excuse, and then she took it a second time. I know this because it wasn’t sitting on my desk where I left it. I asked her for it back. “You’re only acting this way because your mom died.” Seriously, she said that. Then she said that I could try being a little friendlier, she didn’t mean anything by taking my stuff. She thought I didn’t want it. Was this because my boyfriend broke up with me right after my mom died. I told her I just wanted my book. And when she left the room she told me that I misunderstimate, which doesn’t even make any sense but it made me think about your lecture on slips. I still had no book. I sat down at my desk and I, I’m embarrassed to tell you this, but I guess I want you to know that I cried. I come from a poor family, and we were always getting sick. We got sick, sick like dogs, sick like those on welfare, sick like people with broken hearts. The sickness hurts, but what are you going to do? So I left. I started college, I moved East and left mom in Nevada. She loved me like her daughter, but I left her like a son. I went to school and she knew nothing about school and I started dating Spencer who definitely wasn’t dating me for my looks, but then she died. And he left. I lived in that room for the last four years and by the time she was done stealing my stuff I didn’t have much left besides my bed, desk, and some of my books. My desk sat in front of a window that faces West which mostly matters because I used to live on the tenth floor. It was the last day of class. Mom would never get to see it, me walking, the whole thing, but I would be graduating. I tapped my pencil. I tapped my pencil once, twice, three times, and then I tapped it to a four-four time signature. You came over to me and tap tap tapped my desk with your soft finger. You whispered to me to shh. We were taking finals and I was a distraction. Spencer told me I wasn’t pretty, that’s not why he was with me. He told me I could be charming when I tried to be. I should cheer up a little more often. I’ve never been a distraction. In-between drawing bubbles in the shape of a whirlpool with my number two pencil, I watched you pace the front of the room. The soles of your Beckett Simonon dress shoes made a clicking noise as they met the ground. Look who’s the distraction now? Your eyes scanned the room, your palm reached inside your hip pocket. I would miss you. Later that night, I should have been packing up, I’d need to leave the dorm in two days. I sat down, logged onto my laptop, and the thief threw my book at me. It hit my desk leg and page ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, and fifty-two all bent. She didn’t say anything. Nothing. I carefully unfolded the pages, trying to decrease them, and she left. My hair is long like a cobweb stretched straight across the corner of a room and I’m thinking about this because it tickled a little, wisped along my shoulders, which made me feel even more nervous when I sent you that email. You scanned in my final exam result that afternoon, quicker than any of my other professors, and I passed. Part of me wishes I hadn’t passed my test, because then I’d have gotten to spend more time with you next year. Send. I want to see you again. Spencer rubbed my back when he told me he was breaking up with me. He worded it more like “I think this will be best for us” but he doesn’t know what’s best for me. Cups of coffee, half smiles from other people, and fitted suits are what’s best for me. Spencer knew my mom had just died, but we were both graduating. We were in my room. His eyes slanted forward when he tried not to look me straight on. He wasn’t wearing a shirt underneath his Chicago Bulls hoodie, but he never wore a shirt under his hoodies. He hadn’t washed his hair in a week. After the breakup, his friend Jeremy told me it was best. Spencer’d been kissing girls in bars, big sloppy wet ones after he drank too many Old Fashions, with lipstick tire tracks smeared on his chin. There was a blond he kept taking home on the weekends he wasn’t with me. I need you to know that I didn’t really love him that much. DeGarmo Hall is small, you know. Square, with brick foundation and translucent windows. Each wall of the building is made almost entirely of windows. I could see it across campus, barely, but I could see it. It’s the building that your office is in, and I could see it out my window when I would sit at my desk. I used to live on the tenth floor. You never answered my email that night. I told myself it was because you were grading other final exams. You were packing for vacation. You were cooking an old Italian, secret-family-recipe for dinner. I told myself it could have been a lot of reasons, but I didn’t believe any of them. No. You were avoiding me. You were embarrassed of me. Or maybe you wanted what you sent back to sound perfect and it would take you time. I spent all night with the taste of my own snot and spit as I cried, on my back, staring at the cottage cheese ceiling in the dim light of my floor lamp. I still hadn’t packed. In the morning I sent another email. Just want to make sure you got my email. By the afternoon I sent you two more. Throughout the night I sent three. Why aren’t you answering? It isn’t hard, the internet, to find things. I typed in your name on Facebook to find your city, I typed in your name and city into the search engine to find your phone number. And your home address. And then I stared at the two numbers in front of me like they were a diagnosis. I typed and my heart raced and my typing sounded like the four-four time signature of my pencil tapping and, just like before, I’m never a distraction. I called. My skin wet with sweat went numb like when you burn it on the stove, and my breath shallowed like the simmering water above the flame. I typed your number into my phone and each heartless ring left me. Left me. I needed to hear your voice to fall asleep but you never answered. Your voicemail message was just the phone number said by a bot. I left you a voicemail, asking you to call me back. Telling you I missed you. I told your voicemail good night, like a soft kiss, each night for seven days and I didn’t sleep for a week. I wanted to see you again. Now I’m in my car next to DeGarmo Hall on campus. It’s easier to see it this way. It’s West, and my window faced West, but it’s far from up there. From here, I see the grain of the bricks, burgundy sand weathered by years. I see my face reflected in the translucent windows but I can’t see in. From the outside, it’s not easy to tell that everything I own is in my trunk and back seat with me. I went to your house first. Five, six miles away. No, maybe twelve. I drove until I needed to turn left in your neighborhood, right down the dirt road, and another right until the end of the block. Your house is quaint. Yellow siding, white shutters, and a grey roof with a patch that’s starting to sag. A picture window in the front would have made it easy to see inside if your curtains weren’t closed. What were you doing in there? You should let me see. I threw a rock at your window, a small split zippered down the center, but you didn’t answer your door. It doesn’t matter that you weren’t home. I’m eating some potato chips out of a bag I picked up at the gas station because I can’t eat in the cafeteria now that the dorms are shut down. Also, I’ve graduated. If mom was still around, she would have begged me to come back. I try not to think about how Spencer would have reacted to us graduating. Crumbs fall on my seats, I suck grease off my fingers, as I wait in the parking lot of your office. I don’t mind waiting though because waiting isn’t an email or a voicemail. You’ll see me, and I’m hoping to lick you up after work. Hah. Lick you up. You have to admit that’s kind of funny. Just a slip of my tongue. I used to live on the tenth floor.I want to see you again. I am honored that my short story “Fat Girls” has been published on Hobart. I’ve received some curiosity surrounding the inspiration for this story, so here are the ‘behind the scenes’, so-to-speak, below. You may have read this in some of my About Me writings, but in 2011 I was in a fatal car accident. I survived, but was in a coma for a week. When I “woke up,” I was constantly falling in and out of sleep for another week maybe. Then, when I was consistently awake, food sounded disgusting to me for some reason (which was a new experience). I would only eat to stop hunger — once the hunger was gone, my body wanted to eat no more. On top of that, the only food that sounded remotely appetizing was fruit. So for a few weeks, all I ate was fruit, and very little at that. Then I slowly started eating other food, but still, only until I was no longer feeling hunger pains. This lasted for probably three months before I returned to eating more regularly. By the end of those few months, I ended up losing about 20 pounds. If I’m being honest, I didn’t even feel like I had lost weight for probably the first year. I remember returning to school for the first time after my accident and a classmate had said something about me losing weight. I didn’t know what she was talking about. Eventually, I’d come to realize that I did lose weight. Eventually, I began to think that even though everything I went through was horrific, at the very least, I was kind of grateful that I had lost weight without having to do any of the work (and that sounds so awful but think about the culture that made me feel this way). The thing is, I was never “fat” — and saying that makes it sound like “fat” is inherently bad, which isn’t true. But my culture taught me not to be it. To be anything but it, even if I looked at other “fat” woman and thought they were beautiful. So I tried losing weight, to be “skinny”, or skinnier, by eating a little less or walking more, but nothing did much for me. Many of the things that happen in “Fat Girls” are very real experiences that people in the world have had when existing in their body image. I actually cut some of my own experiences out because beta readers said they felt too fake/fabricated (despite having actually happened to me in real life). This includes my (now) ex telling me that I was hot, but I’d be hotter if I lost weight (and was shorter). Originally in “Fat Girls,” this is how Tony broke up with the narrator, but I changed it. After reflecting on having lost weight from a coma and how ‘easy’ it was to do it, to not realize you’re not eating because you’re knocked out, I thought about a world in which people did that intentionally and how it could be a story. I sat on this plot for at least eight years before I finally started writing it. Then I wasn’t sure where to go with it… so it sat for a little while more. I go to the gym, and that’s where some of the plot points I needed hit me. While this is a fictional story and is not about any one person’s experience, it is made up of many real experiences. The same day that I closed my laptop and considered the story done, I was (coincidentally) at the gym and overheard two girls in the locker room talking about their pant sizes, if they felt like they looked like what the number told them they were, and how they felt about their appearance. The same day, I overheard someone else talking about their weight. Parts in the story about the mom questioning what the narrator eats were inspired by someone’s blog post I read. Emmy saying “Oof, I’m full. I should stop eating” is something I accidentally do. Being hit on at the gym is another thing I’ve seen happen. Men making comments about women, like the narrator’s Dad at the bar. Mothers and grandmothers making comments about women, about how much someone weighs, has happened in my own family. “Maybe she shouldn’t eat as much. It’s not the dress’s fault.” Woman making comments about women, looking at other women and judging them happens. All the time. Heifer/Jennifer mentions “How to Get Skinny Fast” in Women’s Health magazine. This is a real article that I saw as I was checking out at the grocery store. I wrote the name down so I could use it in this story. The narrator says, “I heard there’s health reasons and that keeps people from losin’ weight sometimes and I wonder if that’s me. Sleep. Genetics. Thyroids?” — I’ve heard these things, read these things, looked these things up even. Men like Zillo, sexualizing, idolizing young girls. I was 12 the first time a man honked at me while he drove past me walking up to 7–11 to get a Slurpee. And so many other small, cultural things that happen in this story are things that I and many other people are a part of and have experienced or done. So I thought it would be interesting, to write a story that explored the life of someone so desperate to “just be skinny”, and to get all the perks that come with being skinny, that she would put herself through a coma to accomplish it. What would happen? What does that say about her? What does it say about everyone else? I did a bunch of research on which drugs would be able to sedate and not kill to accomplish this, and how one would even get access to that drug, and came up with “Fat Girls”. In this story I explore my experience as a woman being inundated with imagery of what bodies are considered socially acceptable and beautiful, and the kinds of culture that perpetuates this imagery. I don’t have any answers, but my hope for you is to read “Fat Girls” and walk alongside the questions. Do you have answers? Disclaimer: I recognize there are women who are happy with how they look, and women who want to be bigger or curvier. There are men who feel the need to look a different way. etc. These are all valid. And while the story I wrote is not the only story, it isn’t about those other stories either. (although, to be fair, most of these stories are a part of the same culture — one that puts emphasis on our looks.)
Shannon Waite has taught English and Creative Writing in Detroit. Her fiction has been published in PANK, Oakland Arts Review, and elsewhere. www.shannonwaiteauthor.com I am so excited to share that my short story “Fat Girls” has been published over on Hobart today! This story has been in my head for over ten years, and has taken me two and a half to write and finish, but once it was done, I knew it was done. I also had a strong feeling that Hobart would be its home. It was inspired by a few things, and if anyone is interested in the “Behind the Scenes” story of what inspired this piece, let me know and I‘ll write a blog post about it. But in the meantime: please, read this story. I don’t have many answers, but I my hope for you is to read “Fat Girls” and walk alongside the questions. Do you have answers?
Shannon Waite has taught English and Creative Writing in Detroit. Her fiction has been published in PANK, Hobart, Oakland Arts Review, and elsewhere. www.shannonwaiteauthor.com I’m going to throw you right in. Slam. The metal frame of my car crunched and smashed against the car in front of me. I had been stopped and hit from behind at 75mph, jolted forward. The two women who were in my car with me died. Instantly, I think? I don’t remember. Everything I know I read in news articles and learned from other people who weren’t there. Other than not remembering the accident, I somehow ended up surviving with minimal damage (no broken bones, personality changes, or the like, although I think the chronic neck pain, arthritis in my back, and way I misplace words over ten years later are all long-term side effects). I couldn’t write though… I mean, I could, physically, but creatively I was dry. I tell you about my accident because it stopped and restarted who I am as a writer. After it, I wasn’t inspired by anything even though writing had been a huge part of my identity for over fifteen years. Two years later though, I’d graduate with my (first) degree and rediscover storytelling (since I finally had free time again and reread the stories that used to inspire me). I’d soon start teaching, and writing on the side, earning publications and awards. So hi. My name is Shannon Waite and I’m a writer, teacher, and observer of life and people. I write stories about norms, characters who break norms, and society’s wounds. It’s always contemporary, often transgressive. I’ve been writing creatively for a few decades. I’ve taught high school English and Creative Writing in Detroit for nearly a decade, and published student writing in five anthologies while partnered with Pages, a local bookshop, where our books were sold and launch parties were celebrated. Alongside my experience in teaching, I’ve got three degrees and am probably not done. In case you’re curious:
What I Write
I love transgressive fiction. I like dark, unexpected, and critical stories. Things that make me think and things that make me know people. I also love secrets, and this kind of writing always feels like a big, juicy secret. Another rabbit hole I start researching is more specifically how transgressive fiction can impact social change. Literature can have a huge impact on people and culture, and I research ways this can be done. This rabbit hole is deep and I look forward to poking my head out from time to time to share with you what I’m learning. One of the proudest moments of my life was watching my students become accomplished authors. I love working with people to think, plan, and write, and I know that I’m not done sharing all sorts of creative writing techniques with others. That’s why I’m here. My blog will be a resource for readers and writers like you — so you can dive deeper into the transgressive style and-or transform your writing into powerful pieces that engage and move. So here’s where you come in: If you love writing about the dark, or about the sensitive, or about the things that more people need to care about (or about all of the above), then this is the place for you. I give you tools to build your craft and be the writer you love reading. I hope you’ll join me and others in our journey. I will be including posts about: · Transgressive topics · Creative writing skills and strategies · Book reviews (on transgressive fiction) · Online courses (for the writers who plan to excel!) And probably other things from time to time (this is not an all-inclusive list). I truly believe that with enough tools, you can craft the stories you want to tell and I can’t wait to read your progress. Together, we’ll explore things that guide us, inspire us, and work so you can tell your stories (beautifully and effectively! And sometimes persuasively.) Connect with me Website — www.shannonwaiteauthor.com Instagram — @shannonwaiteauthor Recent Publications Hobart - "Fat Girls" PANK — If the Rainbow Exploded Oakland Arts Review — Flames |
I'm Shannon Waite and I write stories about norms, characters who break norms, and society's wounds. They're always contemporary, often transgressive.
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