Nora Roberts has been famously quoted as saying “The only thing you can’t fix is a blank page.”

This is a piece of advice that I need, and often fail, to take seriously.  Before I decided to become a novelist, I did a lot of business and technical writing. 

There are no rough drafts in technical writing.  Oh, I did an outline first and, occasionally, did some clarification when my boss sent something back marked “Don’t understand this paragraph,” but, about 95% of the time, the first draft got no more revision than a typo, format and spelling proof read from someone in the actual tech writing department. 

As a fiction writer, it is essential to get the scene on the page. I can make it fabulous afterward.  But, instead of just throwing it out there, I often find myself agonizing over the wording of some passage or worrying that I’ve repeated a phrase too often. Bringing the whole process to a screaming halt.

And I’m SO OVER writing sex scenes, but that’s a whole ‘nuther topic.

One of my Twitter pals sent me a link for a thing called “Write or Die,” which apparently half the writers in the world already knew about.  It’s a funny little web application.  You set a goal and a level of evil-ness.  Then, a window opens and you type your little fingers off.  If you pause too long, or fall behind your goal, the background turns to threatening colors and “evil sounds” begin to hound you.  Resumption of typing hushes these sounds and restores the plain white background. 

So, like the Nike commercial says, you JUST DO IT. 

I’m loving this for days when it just ain’t flowing.  I’m producing pages. They may be drivel, but I can fix them.

Nora would be proud.