The bonus is of course writing fuel to keep you going for the next few days! So, if you’re struggling on with trying to grind your words out onto the page, maybe try stepping into the kitchen for a quick half-hour break – I’ve put my super easy brownie recipe (adapted from a Nigella recipe to make the end result even fudgier) at the end if you need some inspiration. But for my latest WIP I’ve turned to the plotting side and found the same techniques useful even when just writing my outline and chapter breakdown. Ordinarily I’m a bit of a ‘plantster’ when it comes to writing – I usually have a general idea of where we’re going, but let my characters make their own way there. A meditative break to do something with your hands so you can come back fresh and ready to hit that word count again. Both offer me a creative outlet and the freedom to make mistakes and learn the different tweaks that might just lead to success.Įven if you find cooking a chore – sometimes taking a break and doing a chore can be just what your work in progress needs. There are failures in both (and believe me when I say I have missed the mark on many a dish and many a manuscript) but when you get it right it feels like magic. Pairing this chicken with that sauce and those potatoes – matches how I pick and choose inspiration from settings I’ve researched, true crime cases I’ve heard about and characters I’ve developed. I write my menus in the same way I write my books – bringing together elements I love into something new and exciting. My debut was written primarily over lockdown when I wasn’t working, but whenever I got stuck, I would push back my desk chair, head into the kitchen and warn my boyfriend he was about to have a dinner big enough for fifteen. I’ve learnt the wonder of just allowing my brain to tick it over in the background and feel very lucky that my job allows me the space to do this. ![]() But when I’m struggling with a plot hole or character arc, I’ve learnt to take a step away from the computer and let the book just breathe. Working the odd hours of hospitality can be a God send for focusing on writing – I’m usually off mid-week and in the middle of the day when everyone else is either pulling a different shift pattern or holed up in the office. And I’ve found that switched off from my laptop, with nothing but aching feet and a full line of checks to concentrate on, is usually when my characters start chatting to me. I was (up until recently when Covid-19 took its final swing) running my own catering business, and for nine years before that working my way through cafes, restaurants, bakeries and street food stalls. That, or scribbled paragraphs on torn out sheets of paper from the back of my kitchen notebook – pages crinkled with oil splatters and smeared with indecipherable stains.įor context, perhaps I should explain – for my day job I’m a chef. This is how the majority of progress is made in my writing – via hurried notes tapped into a sticky phone that’s survived more spillages than it has any right to. Later, on a quick break, I nursed a flat white while furiously typing an email to myself with the key scene I needed to get my work in progress back on track. I dropped my knife, opened the Notes app on my phone and tapped in the solution. I was in the midst of dicing a three-kilo sack of onions when my main character popped up and told me how to solve a particularly niggling plot hole that had been driving me crazy. Stephanie Sowden, debut After Everything You Did from Canelo Crime 9 th April 2022
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