Tuesday, February 27, 2007

Writing Ritual


I discovered a year ago that I have this strange writing ritual. After outlining and preplanning my script to death, and right before sitting down to write pages, I find myself hitting the bookshelf for some light reading.

Detective novels and/or thrillers.

I don’t know what it is, but reading these books places me in a zone. I know a lot of writers like to listen to music while they write. Others watch a lot of films in their genre. But for me, it’s the books; the reading of these heavily, plotted stories with pithy sentences and quick dialogue.

I think it starts the ball rolling, in terms of pacing. These books are usually fast-paced, not like drawn-out literary works (which I usually curl up with after a script draft is put to bed).

I’m currently reading High Profile, by Robert B. Parker, one of my two-book-a-month-book-of-the-month-club selections, and I’m amped up. I’ll be starting on actual pages in the next few days, but firs,t I’m going to curl up with Jesse Stone and get into the mood.

Did I mention I’m weird?

1 comment:

Lianne said...

Interesting! Though I can see where you're coming from on this one - I tend to stick to readinf fiction when I'm writing, and if I'm in the planning stages I'm more likely to read non-fiction or screenwriting books. Can't cope with the latter when I'm immersed in the writing.