The Loophole Steven King Uses to Supercharge His Writing Productivity
First-person narration as a strategy for breaking writer's block
I recently gave up on a new, very long Stephen King book. I lost interest half way in. The start of the story had me reaching for the Kindle on my nightstand, but chapters later, I found myself scrolling on Instagram rather than reading. So, I let it go. (Yes, I read on a Kindle, and I prefer it for a number of reasons.)
That book I quit on was called Fairy Tale. It’s about a 17-year-old hero, who befriends and helps a gruff old man, falls in love with his dog, and then discovers a trap door to a hidden world in the old man's shed outback. Once we entered this other dimension, I lost interest. But King’s setup to find this staircase down to another universe, I quite enjoyed.
Also, as a writer, I found myself thinking a lot about the particular writing style that Mr. King chose for this book. While reading Fairy Tale, I realized he used the same tactic in the previous Stephen King book I read. More often than not, Stephen King writes as a first-person narrator. A narrator who is decidedly—not a writer.
This is one of the major keys to why he’s so prolific.
