What works for you?

Last year I was lucky enough to have a novel with two or three story lines going at the same time, so when I would get stuck on one I would simply pick one of the others.

This year my novel is more linear, which is a big challenge for me.
So when I get stuck, I let my characters muck about a little. They go to the library to look for a book, then talk about the Dewey system, then Tom takes the elevator up to the roof to have a smoke and watch dirigibles, which turns out to be a great opportunity for him to have a revelatory talk with Max, while Jeremy's downstairs, and suddenly the plot is back in full gear.

And then there's the times when nothing helps. I'm a great fan of "nulla dies sine linea". In these cases, I will write a single sentence and let it rest. Sometimes I will come back an hour later and that line will naturally flow into a thousand words. Sometimes that's all I'm going to write for the day. So be it.

Hope this gives others some ideas.
If nothing else, I hope someone else decides to include dirigibles in their novel. Never met a story that didn't benefit from a zeppelin. :)

Readin fanfics, Mag7 espcially...

I need some great story to lit it again.

Or update a weekly story (so far 27 chapters, 33k and counting... LOTR story, called - "Broken Spirit")

*Hugs*

Sivan Shemesh

Going for a walk, annoying my cats, cooking—all help. Somethign I've also tried when i get stuck because i can't think of what is going to happen next is to start writing a counterfactual, all in negative. At somepoint a sentence of explanation comes along saying what did happen instead and then off we go.