Working Through or Backing Off?

Here's a piece of advice from Angela Booth that's come in handy lately: "If the writing you're doing doesn't come easily to you, it's not the right kind of writing for you -- at this time... Always write what's FUN for you -- write what you're enthusiastic about."

She's talking more Big Picture, like what genre you're writing in or even whether you're writing fiction or non-fiction, but this week I've found myself applying it just from project to project.

The Cownt story just isn't coming to me. I'm struggling to find the right balance between horror and humor. I don't want it too dark for kids, but I also don't want it to be inane. Gav (artist on the Cownt, if you're just tuning in) recommended an excercise to help me play around and figure it out, but in the meantime, I'm backing off and working instead on a one-shot with Jason Copland. It's frustrating that I can't make myself bang out an excellent Cownt story (I'm anal and stubborn enough to want to force myself through my blocks just to get something off my plate), but he's too cool a property to just hack something out for.

Last fall, I started working on Jason's story and after figuring out what I wanted it to say, I couldn't figure out how to make it interesting (beyond it's very cool high-concept, which was Jason's idea). Knowing Jason wasn't in a hurry for it, I put it aside for a while and now I've got it figured out. Which is to say, this stuff works in mysterious ways and I know I'll figure out the Cownt. Everything in its time.