Sometimes the hardest part about being a writer is finding the motivation to pick up a piece of work that has stagnated and start working on it again.

Some tips to keep myself interested when I hit that slump:

Add a new character. Could be an antagonist, or a new love interest. Spicing it up with a new personality can be a fun way to reinvigorate a story that has gotten a little stale.

Throw a new plot hook at your protagonist. It doesn’t have to be big or even exciting, but sending a character somewhere new in pursuit of something might be the sidetrack that gets the story moving is it’s stalled.

Kill a character. A little extreme, but sometimes a drastic move can give me the kick in the pants I need and get me excited about writing the story around that kind of sudden shakeup.

Delete a chunk of what it already written. Counter intuitive, but there have been a few times when I found myself hitting a wall, either not knowing how to go forward or not wanting to. Grabbing the last chapter and binning forces me to get going and has more often than not gotten me out of a block. Being too attached to what I’ve already written can be disastrous when it just isn’t working for whatever reasons.

Blog about it. Now anyone who reads this will know that I’m stalling. Good motivation to get moving again. Off I go!