Expanding Writer Setting

As I’ve said a few times this month, and last month, and the month before, NaNoWriMo is on my mind. As part of the prep work I keep bringing up, I’ve expanded my writer setting. I haven’t done anything truly special to my space except attach some cork board to my wall, but it’s big for me.

Step one has stalled…

When I was thinking about all of the things I need to learn and relearn in order to dive back into my WIP, I remembered some of the troubles I faced before –like flipping between my research panels and writing panels in Scrivener because I forgot a detail I needed.

Part of the issue is that my character, while similar to me in many mental ways, has a lot of physical skills and work skills I will never have. Unless the apocalypse descends in my lifetime. My character has to know about, not to mention how to use, a variety of weapons to do her job. She’s also had a lifetime of exposure to weapons. Me, not so much. Plus, I have no interest in hunting or hunting implements, so all the things I learn about them have a tendency to be the first details to leave my brain.

Beyond that issue, I’m largely unfamiliar with my setting. I’ve researched significant aspects, have visited, and will continue to learn, but there are things I forget. For instance, I have a terrible sense of direction while driving. I’m better on foot, but 9 times out of 10 if I’m driving somewhere new I get lost. Trying to write a character who does not have that problem is harder than I thought it would be because as the writer I have to know where everything is and be able to transcribe directions to a reader in an interesting fashion.

Obviously, I needed one solution for all of these challenges.

Then I recalled a picture I came across on the internet of Laurell K. Hamilton’s plot wall. She’s over twenty books into her Anita Blake series, by the way. I’m just suffering through one book *breathes into a paper bag*.

Laurell K. Hamilton via Pinterest

Anyway, I knew from the first that sticky notes were not for me. One, they suck. They are not big enough and the glue is not sticky enough for people like me who will change their minds and move things around. Two, they’re really expensive! Three, my cats would have a field day trying to pull those suckers down. And one cat has a glue fixation that I do not like to encourage. Four, I don’t have a wall to devote to sticky notes.

I thought of using cue cards and thumbtacks, but I also didn’t want to decimate the wall space I do have by filling it with little holes. Eventually, I remembered there was such a thing as cork board, and voila! I’ve stalled out on filling it because NaNo is time consuming, but it will be a part of my post-50K therapy.

As much as I love the organization of Pinterest and Scrivener, having something tangible devoted to my story is really inspiring. No, my little space won’t solve all my writing problems, but it does put my WIP in mind constantly and it gives me a place to walk to, to move to, when I’m feeling stuck.

Have you changed your writing setting at all in an effort at improved productivity?

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