Stuck in the middle with you

When the muddy middle turns into the MUDDLE

Dear Readers,

This is part three of my “Art of Finishing” series sparked by a reader question that has needled writers since the beginning of the written word: how to finish your novel.

This week’s question comes from Nancy Chadwick, who asks:

“When writing my last novel and finishing up on another, I had their beginnings and endings written straight away. The middle? Not so much. I seem to be more preoccupied with the story's pacing than with getting something written to just get it to the finish. Any suggestions in moving through the middle?”

Nancy, when you mentioned the “middle” of your novel, I’m afraid you didn’t describe it accurately. It’s known as the muddy middle. Or better: the muddle. Or the muddy muddle. The muddy, muddy muddle. It’s the place most novels go to die.

When you’re writing the beginning of your novel, your words tend to flow to the glowing enchantment of your novel idea—a momentum sparked by the excitement of pursuing a shiny new idea and exploring new worlds. Then, one day, you’re likely to hit a slow patch, and then another slow patch, and then … you might find yourself stuck—and perhaps even sinking.

Part of what creates the mud of the muddy middle is self-doubt. It’s easy to not only question your novel idea but to question yourself as a writer (and perhaps even as a human being).

Remember this: Every writer hits patches like this—even your favorite writer—so you’re not alone.

When your words enter such swampy territory, it’s easy to concede victory to those naysaying voices in your head pulling you ever deeper into these perilous moors, so here are a few things to try.

Let go to hold on

One of the laws of quicksand is that the more you struggle to get out of it, the more trapped you become. Escaping quicksand is actually quite easy, though. Your body is less dense than the sand, so all you have to do is relax, and you’ll float to the surface.

The same principle applies to getting through the bogs of your novel. Your impulse might be to panic and thrash about, but the more frantically you try to lunge forward, the more likely you’ll be to sink. If you relax, though, you can float back up to the surface of your story and catch another gust of wind.

So turn off your computer for a spell, and do whatever it takes to feel a sense of lightness. If you don’t know where your story is going, that’s not a bad thing. View the blank page as an invitation to drop a bucket into the well of your imagination.

Don’t write what you know, write what you want to know. Begin with a detail, a mood. Keep expanding. Keep trying different angles. Find a sentence that surprises you. Switch points of view. Just for the sake of it. Just to experiment. Remember, your mind is acrobatic. Your imagination can take you anywhere.

Try “skipnoveling”

Films aren’t made chronologically, and there’s no rule that a novel has to be written in a linear fashion either. If you’re having trouble with the muddle of that devilish Chapter 7, then give yourself permission to skip it altogether. Move on and just try to reach the end of your novel.

Sometimes it takes a while to solve the bedeviling questions of a novel—sometimes it even takes several drafts. So just sketch some notes in Chapter 7 and move on.

Don’t forget the art of playfulness

I started this series with a call to be playful with your novel as a way to finish it.¹

That’s because writing a novel can feel like drudgery, and the best way to make it undrudgerous—and even fun—is to play with it, to be curious and experimental and wacky and whimsical.

Sometimes it’s hard to know how to be playful, though.

One method I like is the “What if?” game:

• Take a blank sheet of paper—the bigger the better—and write “What if?” at the top.

• Turn on your favorite music.

• Pour your favorite beverage. Get out chips and dip. Make this into a party.

• Start dancing (like no one is watching).

• And then start filling the sheet with novel possibilities.

• Write a few that are just plain wrong to start, just to push some boundaries.

• See how many plot pathways or character realizations you can come up with. The more the merrier.

Another method I like is playing with my characters through questionnaires.

The joy of writing for me is in large part the joy of exploring (and even inhabiting) another character. The degree of our passion for the characters in our stories, whether we love them or hate them, fuels the vigor of our writing and the depth of our commitment.

The best characters are full of mysteries, nuances, peculiarities, and contradictions. You never know where they’ll lead you, which is why they’re so compelling. Like the best people, they make life a surprise.

Here are some interview tools I’ve played with:

The Proust Questionnaire: The Proust Questionnaire is a set of questions, created by the French writer Marcel Proust. Proust answered the questionnaire in a confession album — a form of parlor game popular among Victorians. It later went on to famously become a Vanity Fair feature.

The 36 Questions that Lead to Love: These questions, popularized by The New York Times “Modern Love” column, come from a study that explores whether intimacy between two strangers can be accelerated by having them ask each other a specific series of personal questions.

The thing is to not make your characters in the mold of yourself but to go deep into their peculiarities and differences. Our differences make life a rich and nuanced affair. They create the frissons (and frustrations) of drama we wake up to each day, the mysteries we wend through.

The horizon will beckon you

Once you escape the quicksand, writing one sentence will lead you to another sentence, and you’ll soon see the finish line on the horizon beckoning you. You’ll know that you can keep going by simply putting one word in front of another, and you’ll sense this great gift waiting for you …

The gift of your novel. The gift of your journey. The gift of your accomplishment.

Plus, you’ll know how to deal with quicksand the next time you step into it—in writing and in life.

Because a quote

“A story is not like a road to follow … it's more like a house. You go inside and stay there for a while, wandering back and forth and settling where you like and discovering how the room and corridors relate to each other, how the world outside is altered by being viewed from these windows.”

~ Alice Munro

The rundown

Reading: My Bright Abyss, a powerful book on spirituality and writing by the poet Christian Wiman, and the novel Organ Meats, by K-Ming Chang, because I’m interviewing K-Ming on my Write-minded podcast.

Listening to: the mysterious sounds of Pauline Oliveros

Lusting for: recess

Inspiration: the dash of the sun feathering a heavy, cold cloud (watching the sun rise over a dark field now)

Goal: to pause

Random question: Why do cats think they’re better than dogs? Why do dogs not understand why cats think like this?

Photo prompt: A photo taken in Los Angeles, of course. Make sure you put on a pair of fun boots to get through your muddy middle. These boots were made for walking … and they have a lot of stories to tell.

1. Please buy a pair of go-go boots if you can.