Writer’s block
This guy running the course says it’s a good idea to try talking to one of your characters. So, being a conscientious sort of bloke and, actually, a bit stuck I start typing.
‘You’re not very good at this are you?’
‘Well thanks. What brought that on?’
‘I was thinking about that new character, what’s her name?’
‘I don’t know they’re all new to me, I’ve just made them up.’
‘Lisa, that’s it. Well I was thinking that if I took her for a drink and she asked about what school I went to I’d have no idea. She’d think I was a weirdo – I mean – ‘where did you go to school?’ ‘I don’t know nobody told me.’ That’s not going to get me far is it?’
‘Well I don’t know either. I haven’t thought about it.’
‘You made me support Blyth Spartans when I live in Newcastle – what’s that about? But you can’t decide where I went to school.’
‘I’ve got lots to think about. All the other characters, the plot, whether it’s bloody raining. It’s hard work.’
‘Cue the violins, my heart bleeds. All the effort of lifting that pen and the toll the keyboard takes on your finger ends. Oh, it must be terrible for you. Bollocks – an eight hour shift down a pit – that’s work. It’s more effort to comb my hair – which you gave me thank God – or at least, thank you, because you’re God to me you know.’
‘I know I’ve God like powers – I can make you fat, thin, a pilot, a gravedigger, a virgin. But I’m not actually God and I can’t do everything at once.’
‘Here careful with that virgin idea. That’s another thing about me. I’m a fit, healthy bloke in the prime of life, one of your main characters, we’re 50,000 words in and I haven’t had my leg over yet. What’s going on?’
‘Is that all you think about?’
‘You’re asking me. I work in Newcastle. It’s mid-summer. Don’t you think as I walk home through Bigg Market on a Friday night some thought of sex might just float up?’
‘You don’t go home through Bigg Market.’
‘Oh, well done. Just wondering if you knew who I was. You spend enough time with that other fella, the nutcase that killed an old woman in cold blood. He’s a right psycho, I’d watch it if I were you.’
‘He’s not a psycho, that’s the whole point.’
‘Well I don’t know that do I? Does that mean I don’t catch him? My career will be right down the pan if I don’t clear this up. Mind you I’m not surprised, I don’t get much time on the case.’
‘Yes, the timeline’s a problem. It’s not quite sorted.’
‘Bloody hell.  You mean don’t even know what day it is.  Can’t you pass us over to James Patterson or Elmore Leonard - somebody who knows what they’re on about. At least I’d get some sex.’
‘You’d get dead and if you don’t shut up you might have a nasty accident on that nice motorbike I gave you.’
‘You’re just a bully. We should go on strike.’
‘You already have. That’s why I’m stuck and you’ve been no help. I’m going to talk to Lisa, she’s a journalist and might have a few ideas.’
‘Good luck. She thinks you’re a wan…’          It’s a last resort but you can always stop typing.