The Slutty Writer

“To write a book you have to have a weird maddening mix of impossibly high standards and slutty low, low standards. At the same time. The whole time you are writing.” –Heather Sellers, Chapter After Chapter

I just turned in my third book. More precisely, the complete-overhaul-revision of the third book. Which makes the third time I’ve turned this particular storyline in to this particular publisher.

The first time, I was told that the novel had too much going on (I agreed) and to split it into two separate books (I did). Alyea, Deiq, and Eredion’s POV sequences were published in March 2011 as “Guardians of the Desert”. I sorted out the other POVs, tidied them up and gave them a facelift, and resubmitted them as book three.

The story of that version is here. (Go ahead, refresh your memory, I’ll wait.)

So this version, this third version, this third run past editorial eyes…I tore it completely down to the ground and built it up again from scratch. It’s the same story, if you look at the bones of the plot; the same basic things happen. But how they happen has changed. There’s a small example of what I’m talking about here. There’s a lot more depth, a lot more complexity, a lot more intentional braiding and minor thread storylines worked throughout.

(And unintentional braiding. One of my test readers, looking at the index card timeline chart I have spread out all over the dining room wall at the moment, told me I really needed to publish the series timeline as an appendix in this book, because the overlap of how things are happening in different areas at the same time fascinated her. And I agree–because there are coincidences of timing that I had no intention of setting up, but which are truly neat nonetheless.)

I’m very proud of this version. I’m very confident of it. I’ve cried and laughed while writing it. I’ve made my test readers laugh–and cry–with it. I think I done pretty durn good on this one.

Is it perfect? Not a chance. Not a bleepity bleepity chance. But it’s good enough–as opposed to the previous version, which I told myself was good enough–but wasn’t. Quite.

Another quote, from the same chapter as the above quote:

“You can’t call it Good Enough until you have stretched yourself, dug deep, pushed yourself, and really truly … given the book everything you have. You haven’t pretended to be dumber, lazier, simpler, busier, faster, smarter than you are … When you give it everything, everything, there are still going to be flaws. And that’s when you say, at the very end of the day, Good Enough. Good Enough isn’t settling. It’s celebrating the truth.”

I know without a doubt that my editor will find at least one glaring, ohmygodstupid mistake and a host of other tinier ones. I know without a doubt that when the book is finally published, there will be a dozen tiny typos that myself and the editor both missed and will be very embarrassed over. I know without a doubt that when people start reading the book, some will love it and some won’t “get” it and some will hate it.

But I didn’t go safe on this one, which was the main flaw of my “older” writing style (from five years plus ago). I stretched and I dug and I pushed way harder and deeper than I’ve ever tried to do before. I hope it will be an amazingly, mind-blowingly great book to some readers. It will absolutely fall flatter than a lead pancake for others. But I gave it everything I had, and I totally believe, minor (and normal) glitches aside, that it’s solid. I did my best. I did what I could. And at the end of today–that’s Good Enough.

Tomorrow … well, tomorrow’s another day…

(Oh, and if you’re curious, Heather Seller’s web site is here. She’s a freaking genius. Go read Chapter After Chapter. Invest in a copy. My copy has a permanent home on my bedside table when I’m deep in a project.)

And if you’re struggling with doubt as to whether your writing is good enough: it is. JUST KEEP GOING.  :)

 

On the Way to Writing a Speech….

I’ve been hijacked. Yes, I was sitting at my desk this morning, minding my own business, thank you, and trying to organize notes for a speech coming up this weekend; suddenly these words started spilling out onto the screen, ostensibly to help with the speech. After about three paragraphs I could see that this really had nothing at all to do with the proposed speech; I forced the attacking sentences over into their own file to see what they would do in a setting all their own. They settled down fairly quickly, and became almost tame; and as they allowed me to groom them into a much sleeker appearance, I decided to reward the former hijackers with a blog post spot. So here you go: I hope you enjoy it. I’m going back to writing that damn speech now…. 

Finishing A Novel

Having published one book sounds impressive; having another one due out next spring sounds fantastic. But the most amazing thing of all, to me, about those two novels isn’t that they were published: it’s that I finished them in the first place. That’s a huge milestone in any writer’s life: seeing a project through to the end and not allowing the demons of doubt to sabotage your efforts.

To give my two published books a certain perspective, I offer this quote from one of my favorite writing mentors, Heather Sellers, from her book Chapter After Chapter.

“Here’s the Super Secret. The book writer’s clubhouse password, what you have to be able to say to get in the room: There are book manuscripts under my bed.”

I have three novels, written in high school, each about fifty thousand words long; about eight years ago, I took them out from “under the bed” and systematically shredded every trace of them I could find. I’ve never regretted it; they were that bad. I have about six more novels in varying stages of completion (one only needs about ten thousand more words, but I am utterly and comprehensively stuck on it), and I may never finish any of them; I have two or three more finished manuscripts from the last ten years that I’m too afraid to look back at, in case they’re as bad as I think they are. So finishing a novel is the big prize, for me; it’s become easier with practice, like everything else does, but I still get a huge thrill every time I close out the last page. 

If you’re a writer, and you’re worried about what to write or how to write, listen closely: all the technique and style and profound content in the world doesn’t matter if you can’t finish the story. So just practice finishing a novel. It doesn’t matter a bit if the story is terrible, if you can’t spell, if your grammar is lousy. Those things will slow you down, sure, and make a longer road to publication; but experience will smooth over those bumps eventually.

Finish the damn thing. Then go take yourself out for the most extravagant treat you can imagine: a ‘luxe sundae strictly forbidden under your current diet, one more jungle-plant for your overcrowded living room, that ridiculously expensive pair of shoes you’ve been eyeing longingly. Make that a habit: part of a carrot/stick schtick. Over time, you can scale the rewards: finished a chapter, get a small treat. Finish a book, get a huge treat. Send out a query letter, get a medium treat. And so on. In the beginning, however, make all the rewards for finishing a short story or a novel outrageous; as each skill becomes “old hat”, scale the reward down. Then find something else that scares the crap out of you to assign a ridiculously extravagant award to. Before you know it, you’ll be saying, “Yes, I have a book published, and that is amazing, but what you don’t know is how many manuscripts I have under my bed….”

*ahem* and I believe I’ve finished this blog post now. Time to go add just a bit of chocolate to my morning coffee….