I don’t write every day. Some days, I get up early in the morning with an idea I’ve thought about during the night and I start writing. Before I know it, it’s evening, and the whole day has gone by. Other times, I don’t write for days. Some people are much more disciplined about writing, but I think we’re all different. Just like different study habits can be effective for different people, there are a lot of different writing habits that can work. If you watch people in a classroom, you’ll see there are people who take copious notes and people who sit back and just take it in. I’m one of those people who just takes it in.
So here’s a writing habit that works for me. If it doesn’t work for you, that’s all right; different habits work better for different people.
I think about the book I’m writing constantly. I create a playlist on my iPod with songs that remind me of different parts of the book. The playlist for Children of Abraham included “New York, New York” by Frank Sinatra, because some of it took place in New York. It included “Be My Hero” by Enrique Iglesias, because there was a particular scene where that fit. I played my playlist constantly, because it inspired my creative juices. The music reminded me that I was writing a book and kept me thinking about it until I arrived at solutions to whatever narrative problems I had at the time. Even if you paint yourself into a corner, there’s always a way to get out—you just have to think about it long enough.