The Amazing Writer's Block Sock Monkey Cure
My friend, the Disco Mermaid Eve, was having trouble writing . . .

(Above: Three Mermaids, a Poet and Moi. All have experienced writer's block -- hereby known as WB)

So she lamented about her condition on her/his/their blog.

I could totally sympathize with getting writer's block. It's an affliction that seems to plague students with book reports due, writers with books due, and anyone who's ever sat down to pen something. I recounted the time I could not write until I had a sock monkey. Yes, a sock monkey. Somehow I got it in my head that the only cure for my writer's block would be to have my own sock monkey.

I relayed this to my editor Arthur Levine, who promptly sent me an invisible one, seen here . . .







Still, it was not enough. So Hubby gallantly went out in search of one. He found one in Melanie's office at work, plead his case ("my wife can't write without a sock monkey and if she can't write, my life is miserable"), and brought it home. And TA DA!


(Above: Find the sock monkey.)

The curse of the writer's block was cured. It's that simple. But not always.

Whenever I teach, give speeches, or sign potted plants . . .

. . . people always ask, "What do you do about writer's block?" It would sound funny to say, "Get a sock monkey," so instead I tell them, some of other stuff I do, when hit by WB:

1) Write anything (even if it's just notes, grocery lists, or reminders that I will forget to take with me)
2) Surf the internet (this keeps me in my chair)
3) Answer questions/ask questions on my YA Novelist listserv (this is the authors' version of the water cooler)
4) Read excerpts from favorite books (this gets me inspired)
5) Look at my sock monkey (this gets me inspired)
6) Ask my assistant, sent by my publisher to help me, to fetch me a beverage . . .

(Oops. Wait. No, er, I was confusing myself with Emma Thompson in STRANGER THAN FICTION. Sorry about that.)
7) Comment on the SCBWI Discussion Board (if I'm not working on the craft, at least I can be talking about it)
8) Blog (yes, this counts as writing/reading)
9) Eat chocolate or jelly beans or both (necessary for fuel)
10) Send lots of e-mails (I consider this writing)
10a) Think about whether or not to get another backpack purse and check eBay for the best bargins, but wonder if I should get black, which goes with everything, or brown, which is nice (no comment)

It really helps that I have an inspirational office. (Others call it cluttered.) But there's stuff everywhere, so I don't have the opportunity to get bored.







Oh wait, there's one more thing I do when WB hits. I wail, cry, moan and groan and feel sorry for myself. The I write a sentence. Usually, it's a really bad one. But one bad sentence is better than no sentence at all. So then I write another one, and then another one. And I keep going and remind myself that I can always revise later.