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Have you given yourself the permission to write yet? Why not? I know it sounds simplistic but it is really that simple. I am not saying you won’t make mistakes along the way - we all do - and it is part of the craft. We all have gotten very concerned with mechanics and technicalities and yes, they are an important part of writing. However, too many writers, early in their career, can get so caught up in these two components as to deny themselves the permission to write.

I was having a conversation with another writer who has written poetry since he/she was 16 years old and now is taking that big step into attempting a fiction/romance novel. The story is there but the writer feels so caught up in technicalities that, to quote the person, “The opening is so technical, it is a snooze.” This person continued on to ask how to handle a timeline as he/she has a lot of detail in it. Is that a problem?

I explained my background re: writing. It seems that I have always written poetry and now have branched out to short stories, articles, commentaries/editorials, novels and reviews. As far as my experience at writing novels, I have four that are W.I.P. - one a fantasy novel being reviewed and critiqued as I write this, one western complete looking for a home and a published western novel “Trawlaine’s Land.”

There are stumbling blocks we all have to watch out for in our own writing, two of which I call the Male and Female Syndromes. These are easy to spot in some novella and novels, the Female Syndrome (I will overdo just for sake of example): “Annie walked into the parlor of the old Victorian style home and, looking around the room, she notice that the furnishings were originals of the Victorian era that showed their age. The wallpaper was these darling little blue periwinkles on a pale brownish pink background.”

The Male Syndrome: “Annie was ushered into the parlor of the Old Victorian home. The chairs and tables looked original and showed enough wear, everything seeming dusty and the wallpaper faded with blue flowers on what once must have been a pink background.” They both said the same thing in entirely different ways, neither is wrong nor is either one totally well written. As writers, we should seek that fine spot somewhere between both styles, not overload the description nor make it so sparse as to not being believable. I'm not saying that either was one or the other, just different from one another.

Timelines: These get tricky. How many times have you written the events of a day in one of your stories only to find out that your day now has thirty-two hours? Oops! The main thing to do in writing is to pour your heart out on the page and keep on writing until you cover the entire story. Get it all down beginning, middle and end. End of step one.

Now you have your first full draft. Print it out and turn off the computer. Set the printed pages down and go on to the next thing or anything else for at least two weeks. Then pick up the printed pages and the writer’s most important tool (other than the computer) - the dreaded “RED PEN” - and read what is on the page. It is best if you read it aloud. That way you hear the 'voice' and you can start making corrections, changes, deletions, and additions to your new masterpiece of wordsmithing. When you get your mind off the project for a couple of weeks and go back to it, you will find yourself asking, “Why did I say that?” “What did I mean here?” “When did I think they found time to do that?” All kinds of surprises we as writers do - I repeat DO - get caught up in our own stories and find that the story has changed itself as we slaved away with OUR idea. It is the fresh look that will help you out.