When You Don’t Know What Happens Next, Ask Your Characters
After stepping away from your novel for a while, sitting back down can feel harder than expected, even disorienting. You open the document, reread a few paragraphs, and quickly realize you’re no longer sure where the story was headed or what problem you were trying to solve before life pulled your attention elsewhere.
This moment stops many writers.
It’s tempting to assume the issue is structural, which often leads to outlining again, reorganizing notes, or searching for the “right” next move before writing another word. The work starts to feel complicated very quickly, especially if you already worry that stepping away set you back.
But reentry doesn’t have to begin with solving the novel.
Sometimes it begins with reconnecting to the people inside it.
Reconnecting After Time Away
One of the simplest ways to return to your manuscript is to treat your protagonist as someone you can have a conversation with rather than someone you need to manage on the page. Open a blank document and write directly to your main character. Tell them where you’ve been. Ask what’s been happening while you were gone. Ask what they want right now, or what feels unresolved from their perspective.
The exercise can feel awkward at first, particularly if you’re used to approaching writing analytically, but something shifts when you stop trying to control the story and instead listen for emotional truth. Characters carry desire, fear, resentment, and contradiction long before plot mechanics fully reveal themselves, and engaging with those internal tensions often restarts movement naturally.
Let Your Characters Help You Find the Way Forward
You can also let characters talk to each other without worrying whether the scene belongs in the final manuscript. Write dialogue that exists purely for discovery. Let them argue, misunderstand one another, or say things they would normally avoid saying in a polished draft.
I’m currently working with a coaching client who ran into a stubborn plot problem she couldn’t untangle. Rather than stepping back to outline again, she wrote several pages of conversation between the characters involved, allowing them to wrestle openly with the situation. By the end of the exercise, she understood what needed to happen next, even though much of what she wrote will likely disappear in revision.
That exploratory scene did its job anyway.
Writers sometimes forget that stories move forward because characters make decisions, not because authors force solutions into place. When we try to think our way out of being stuck, we often move further from the emotional logic driving the story. Giving characters space to react instead of directing them toward an outcome allows the narrative to regain momentum in a way that feels earned rather than engineered.
If you’re returning after time away and feel unsure where to begin, try writing something no one else will ever read. Remove the expectation that the work must be efficient or usable. Let curiosity lead for a while.
You aren’t drafting for publication in that moment. You’re reacquainting yourself with the story.
Often, what feels like writer’s block is simply distance from your
character's perspective. Spending time in conversation restores familiarity, and familiarity makes it easier to continue.
Your characters have been waiting for you, even if you stepped away longer than you intended.
Sometimes the next step isn’t figuring out what happens next.
It’s listening closely enough to hear what they’ve been trying to tell you all along.
If you’re reading this because you’ve been away from your manuscript for a while, I also recommend reading a related post: Is it Okay to Take a Break from Your Novel? (Yes.)
