Sometimes there's really nothing you can do, and writer's block will just come and go. But for me personally, aside from just pushing through it, if it's for a fic I'm already writing, I like to see if I can skip to another scene and just come back to the part that's been troublesome later! Sometimes focusing on something that feels more 'right' to write for a while helps to keep your brain working smoothly, at least that's what I think.
Doing a little bit of lore-building helps me. Adding to the world in which your story takes place can give you the ideas you need.
Sometimes there's really nothing you can do, and writer's block will just come and go. But for me personally, aside from just pushing through it, if it's for a fic I'm already writing, I like to see if I can skip to another scene and just come back to the part that's been troublesome later! Sometimes focusing on something that feels more 'right' to write for a while helps to keep your brain working smoothly, at least that's what I think.
In terms of plot ideas, there are lots of long lists of those on Tumblr and the like if you know where to look, they're especially nice for writing drabbles! Our Weekly Prompt Thread is also a long-running great resource I'd also recommend
Experimenting with writing styles or formats as a whole might also be fun? You could try to challenge yourself to write in the style of a specific author, or limit yourself to a specific amount of words (like a 100-word drabble), or try to just go through the dictionary and look for a specific word to base your piece on, things like that. Thinking outside the box to make writing more fun helps a lot I think!
Also maybe working on something smaller scale (like a short story) could also help if having trouble with a larger/longer story can help, right?
Yeah, I've had to do that to expand my world. It helps bring the world's history together and create plot points.
Counter question: when referring to either of these, what do you see as the projected length of either? I believe ultimately the answer your looking for is a bit subjective, but an approximate idea of how many pages constitutes a short story vs a novel for your sample size may help me ponder this.
I never really thought of that. We know that Short Stories have 10,000 words or fewer. Novels can be however long one wants/needs them to be...
I think a lot depends on your personal definition. For example, I'd say a fic with less than 15 chapters of reasonable length (Max 4500 words each) would be a short story - personally I keep all my chapters, regardless of type, under 3500 words where possible because mobile users suffer otherwise.
This is certainly one of those things that is subjective. Something that I should honestly decide for myself.
Unless you have a way to add markers to individual parts of a chapter or something (which I have yet to see anywhere, actually; certainly not here on Bulbagarden, at least), sorting through thousands of words on a tiny phone screen with a potentially very finicky touchscreen and browser tends not to be a very fun experience, no.
Not necessarily. I've found in my experience as a writer that complexity is as much about themes, plotting, and the actual kind of story that you want to tell regardless of however many words that may take. Also note that what qualifies as "short" when it comes to stories in general is rather arbitrary as are the supposed definitions of what is short; something that's 10,001 words instead of, say, 9,998 doesn't just become a novella just like that, right? You could just as easily call something that's 20,000 words a really long short story if you wanted to, especially if it's intended to be read in one take and has no chapters. With having chapters being more of what defines what a novel is, I think (or a traditional one, anyway); it's more of a format for telling stories more than merely something that passes an, again, largely arbitrary word limit. Just as some stories may work better as a comic book or manga than a novel, or as a serial than a novel, or as a movie than a novel, there are indeed some stories that would work better as short stories than novels. That decision is really one that you'll have to make for yourself, I think, based on your understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of each format and on your personal preferences, the latter of which might be more important than you think.
There is more text to read before a visible break - and unlike on PC, you can't easily save a specific line where you are up to.
Like Infinite said, the overwhelming amount of text can make it hard to manage.
It might work. It depends perhaps set a soft and a hard cap. That way if it goes over you won't feel too bad about it.
That's a good idea.
