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Craft of Writing

Magdalena Ball

How to Write a Novel Amidst the Clamour of Small Children

The best way to write a novel is quickly. So experts advise. Just write it all out, for as long as it takes, without stopping to criticise yourself. It's sound advice, but with young children hungry for attention, and a myriad of other commitments (like a "day job," participating at children's school, various other writing jobs, and, of course, the household), finding long stretches of concentrated writing time just isn't feasible. So how do you tackle a long-term project like a novel when everything else is so much more urgent? It helps if you are just a wee bit insane, utterly desperate to get that novel finished (a lifetime dream), and ridiculously tenacious. Your friends and family will probably tell you to wait until the kids are older, but if you are ready to write now, you should write now. There will never be a better time, and time seems to be a shrinking commodity for parents, regardless of your children's ages. Following are some practical tips to help writing parents achieve that big novel:

1. Chunk it. It's a standard time management technique and critical for parents ("How do you eat an elephant?"). Turn your long-term, non-urgent big project into short-term, small, achievable and more urgent tasks. Break up the novel-writing process into little pieces. The first task is to write out the plan. Then it might be writing a quick outline. Then one chapter at a time. Don't look ahead or think about the big picture once you've got the plan in place, as that can be daunting. You're only writing the equivalent of a short story for each chapter, which is much less scary.

2. Write it in to your weekly plan. Children aren't generally amenable to an inflexible "to-do" list. They have high attention days which don't coincide with your workload. But if you create a flexible weekly plan, which include all of the things you need to accomplish, including your small chunk (or maybe half the chunk, or even a quarter), you will give it the same attention as everything else.

3. Learn to multitask. If you're a parent, you're already doing this, so it's just a matter of extending the tasks. Not only are you working from home, entertaining and educating the kids, making dinner, and doing potty duty, you're also working on the novel. Open it up first thing in the morning, and keep moving back to it, doing a sentence here or a sentence there. Don't wait for a large portion of quiet time or an ideal space. Those things don't go hand in hand with parenthood. Instead, learn to work wherever, under any conditions, furtively, and regularly, with whatever time you can snatch. Even if you only do one sentence, your mind will carry the work forward, making the next sentence easier.

4. Let everything inspire you. Writers notice everything. While playing with your children outside, notice the setting, the way the wind moves the leaves on the trees, the way your children smile, the sunlight shining on their hair. Notice their interactions with one another. Notice your own emotions towards them. Then write the details into your work. Everything is material, and your gorgeous children can be your greatest inspiration. Writing isn't like other types of work, where you need time off (though you may need time away from the computer, to be sure). It's a vocation, and you can "work" while you play.

5. Think positively. Imagine the novel finished. Plan to finish it this year, and smile at the prospect. It may seem insane (and others may corroborate that assessment), but, just like the tortoise of Aesop's Fable, your slow crawl forward will ultimately end with a finished novel, made much deeper as a result of that spiritual wonder that comes with parenthood. Oh, and don't worry too much about quality. That will come with revision. Just write it all out—get the story, structure, and characters in place, and you can clean it all up later.

Of course, once you're finished with the first draft, the long slow process of revision cuts in, and the same principles apply: you have to chunk it, plan it, keep at it in small but regular increments, allow yourself to be inspired (rather than irritated) by the children, and maintain an affirmative perspective. You really don't need an ideal workspace (I work in the corner of the living room on an old converted hutch where I can supervise the kids at play while working) or lengthy periods of quiet (what's that?). Don't wait until the kids are grown. You can write that novel right now, amidst the clamour of your young kids.


About the Author
Magdalena Ball runs The Compulsive Reader web site. Her short stories, editorials, poetry, reviews and articles have appeared in a wide number of printed anthologies and journals including Imago, Coppertales, Drexel Journal, Midwest Book Reviews, Relix Magazine, The Writer and Thylazine. Her nonfiction book, The Art of Assessment: How to Review Anything, is available from http://www.compulsivereader.com/html/images/assessmentorderform.html, and her first novel, Sleep Before Evening, is currently under consideration by a number of publishers.