Getting stuck. Again.

Starting a new series is hellish. No, hang on, that’s not quite right. Starting a new series is exciting – and hellish. There are too many possibilities, that’s the trouble, and for every decision I make, something is both gained and lost. And the lost bits sit on the pages of my notebook gazing up at me like a heartbroken puppy and saying, ‘Are you sure you don’t want me? Really?’

But these decisions have to be made. And sometimes they’re the wrong ones …

I got stuck last week. Horribly impossibly stuck. I’d sit down to write and creak out about five words – then start to doubt them. Aaaaargh! Such a horrible state of mind. I remember it from when I started the Hidden series – the agony of it, the stumbling around for the real story, the uncertainty, the stuckness. I’m beginning to think it’s a necessary part of starting a new series.

Anyway, last week I got to the point where I just stopped trying and gave myself the rest of the week off. Which was clearly the right thing to do, because yesterday morning new ideas started to sidle into my mind – ideas that made sense of the things that had been bugging me. So I’ve been taking notes all weekend, going for walks with bits of scrap paper and a pencil, waking up in the middle of the night and fumbling for the notebook I keep beside the bed – and hopefully the stuckness is gone.

Today I’m going to make some notes on what people want. Tomorrow I’m going to replot. See where it takes me. Fingers crossed. I’m liking the fact that I don’t yet have a contract for this series. Makes all this messing around not quite so fraught.