Category: writing

Starting and finishing books

Since I finished a book last week and am picking up another one I started on a couple months ago, I decided to share some thoughts.

Some of you might not have written a book before but are thinking about it or are busy on your first. And it’s terrifying and you’re biting your nails and thinking, “OMG, I have NO IDEA what I’m doing!” And you know what? Don’t let that feeling discourage you, because you will pretty much always feel that way when you start a new project. I’ve finished eleven books over the past eighteen years, and I’m starting my twelfth now, and I still have no idea how to write books.

Okay, that’s not exactly true. Obviously I’ve learned a lot and improved my skills and all, including my discipline and perseverance (I highly recommend getting some levels in those two, because they will be invaluable if you want to write novels). But novels are big and messy and complicated and there’s no magic step-by-step formula for figuring everything out. And the methods I use to figure out who my characters are and what they’re going to do in one book won’t work at all for another book, and I have to muddle through the confusion with no real map. In short, there’s nothing scarier than a blank page. It strikes terror in the hearts of millions.

The scary never goes away, and every time I start something new, I find myself going, “Uh, wait, how did I do this before? Was I possessed by wizards all those other times I made this happen, because I don’t even know how to get started, and obviously if I’d really done this so many times before, I’d know what I was doing by now.” I look at the book on the shelf with my name on it and think, “How exactly did that get there?”

I don’t remember who, but someone once said that you can’t learn to write books, you can only learn to write the book you’re working on. It’s so true.

Finishing a book is much less scary than starting one (or at least it’s scary in a different way), but it’s hard to get there. I think for every book I’ve written, there’ve been times when I thought I was really never going to finish. Some of them I *knew* I would finish, but there were still extreme moments (read: days, weeks, months) of doubt. Doubt that even if I finished it, it was going to be stupid. Doubt that the whole premise was stupid. There was a time when I was writing Renegade X, about 1/3 of the way through (that’s where I ALWAYS have my freak out–I’ve learned now to ignore any doubts I have at the 1/3 mark), where I started questioning everything. My scenes started to unravel until I was worrying that this book I was loving working on and writing in like mad was completely stupid. Too stupid to exist, really, and here I’d written so much of it and I should probably toss it all and start over on something new.

NO! Thankfully, I didn’t. And you can convince yourself that *any* book is too stupid to exist, or that no one will love it. Your brain will set traps for you while you’re writing. No matter how much fun you’re having, no matter how in love with your characters you are, some part of your brain is sitting there rubbing its hands together and going, “Now, what lies can I spread to sabotage this?” There is unfortunately no cure for this, but the good news is it can be treated with discipline and perseverance.

The more books you write, the more you learn to ignore the lies your brain tries to tell you. Doubts go with the territory, but you can learn to ignore them and keep going. And frankly, if writing wasn’t scary, it wouldn’t be exciting either.

Writing Wednesday – Dealing with Writer’s Block

I claimed I was going to do a post about writing today, but I had trouble deciding on a topic, so I procrastinated until now. And even now I’m still not sure what this post is about, but as I type this, some ideas are forming because, well, butt in chair, fingers on keyboard kind of puts you in the hot seat, and then you either get up and walk away, or you make the magic happen.

Which is writing–and being a writer–in a nutshell. (Probably a largish shell, like a walnut, with twisty spaces and maybe a few walnut crumbs inside.) It’s really easy to say, “Eh, well, I don’t know what happens in the next scene, so… Ooh, look, the kitchen needs cleaning and there’s yarn shopping I could be doing because several hundred skeins just isn’t enough!” And yeah, sometimes I sit down and I really don’t know what happens next and my brain just isn’t on the right track and I can’t find the right word thread to get me going on a scene. And I sit there until my eyes get blurry and there are STRESS chemicals raging in my chest and I have to stop and do something else for awhile. But I try not to let that be the norm, and I always try to come back to it as soon as I’m feeling better.

I guess you could call that writer’s block (or writer’s wrage), though I’m never sure what people mean by “writer’s block” because it could mean a couple of things, ranging from not knowing what scene comes next to not knowing what book to write next or even knowing what happens but the words for it are being elusive. So basically writer’s block could mean technical problems with the book, or it could mean a lack of enthusiasm from the writer.

And you know what?

I have these problems all the time.

I’ll tell you lack of enthusiasm is definitely the hardest to deal with, because the reasoning behind it is usually hard to diagnose. Fear and stress can dry up your creativity like nobody’s business. Or sometimes it turns out to be some kind of health problem like not having enough vitamin D or not getting enough exercise. And sure, if you know you’re having creative problems because you’re not getting enough exercise, then the answer is pretty straight forward. But sometimes you don’t know why you hate your book or why you love reading your book but hate working on it.

But the lack of enthusiasm problem can also come up because writers sometimes feel like they need “filler” scenes. And this can creep up on you, especially if you find yourself going, “AGH, I really don’t want to write this boring scene that I hate, but I NEED it for the story.” Forcing yourself to slog through scenes you don’t like can make you, you know, not want to work on them. And the truth is? No matter how much you think you *need* that boring filler scene, if it’s boring, then you don’t need it. It’s like saying you need ugly weeds in your garden so your flowers can feel extra pretty.

So cut it and figure out something else that can go there. Don’t waste your garden space on weeds, because you’re going to need all the flowers you can get. And if you really don’t want to cut it? Add something that makes you love it. If you’re like, “It’s really important that the scullery maid washes all these dishes in this scene because that’s how she cuts her hand and gets it infected and loses it later on, and we HAVE to see it happen, so it has to stay!” then add something to it that makes it cool. Like while the scullery maid is washing these boring old dishes, someone comes in and says, “Hey, the prince you’re not-so-secretly in love with is getting married to your worst enemy! Oops, didn’t mean to startle you and make you drop a dish and cut yourself on it.” Now this boring old scene has stuff that makes you squee inside and go, “OMG, I can’t wait for that to happen!” It could be anything, really, as long as it gives you that scene-crush feeling.

You should have a scene-crush on every scene! Isn’t that awesome? Isn’t it awesome and liberating and exciting that every single scene in the book should have something that makes you drool with anticipation? It can sound overwhelming at first, but it also means you have permission to have fun with every scene in your book. That doesn’t mean they’re all going to be easy to write, but it does mean you can look forward to them all.

And… this post is getting kind of long, and I’ve only addressed one type of writer’s block, so I will continue it in another post.

So this book I’m writing…

is really hard! That’s why I’m blogging about it instead of actually working on it. It’s middle grade, and those are always really hard for me. (I say “always” as if I’ve written a lot of them. This will only be my second.) The last one I wrote took me several years–working off and on–and my YA books usually only take a few months, if that. I’d work on it, get a few k in, and then feel like I couldn’t go on and give up, only to reread it a few months later and be like, “What was I thinking? This is AWESOME!” And it’s not like it was an emotional book or anything–it was hilarious.

This one I’m working on now is also awesome. Possibly one of the most awesome projects I’ve worked on. And I keep thinking, “If it’s so good, why can’t I just get obsessed with working on it already and zoom through it?” That’s my normal MO, and it’s just not happening. It’s tough. I started this book last June, maybe? And I’ve got almost 9k. I’ve taken breaks. I haven’t given up on this one (mostly because The Spouse is in love with it and that makes me feel a little more validated), but I’ve put it aside multiple times. Sometimes to work on other projects, sometimes just because it was hard.

This month I’m doing Jano (fake Nano in January) and trying to finish it, because I really love this book and I don’t want it to take several years to hit “the end.” Last year I killed at Jano, churning out 60k and finishing up my first draft of Shades of Rome. This year… it’s slow going. I don’t get words every day. And no matter how many words I get the day before, the next day feels just as hard, like Sisyphus rolling a giant boulder up a hill. I mean, in a way that’s always how novel writing feels–you hit your word goal, feel great, and then in the morning you start over. You’re only as good as the words you’ve written TODAY. But usually if I’ve gotten words down the day before, if I get my butt in the chair the next morning, it’s not too hard to get the words flowing again.

This book? This book is slow going. And it doesn’t help that when I wrote slowly, I start to agonize. I tend to believe/feel like fast writing is better writing. So if I’m writing slowly, something must be wrong. I must be sucking or this book must not really be that cool, because if it was actually cool and if I actually loved it enough, I’d be speeding right along. But I think I have to face the facts that this book is just hard for me. With both middle grade books I’ve worked on, I’ve felt like I loved reading the end product more than I loved working on it. It’s not something I’d want to do all the time, but sometimes the right book comes along that’s worth the effort. I’m always hopeful that I’ll hit my stride and everything will fall into place and speed up, but even if I don’t? Maybe that’s okay sometimes.

2010, Meet 2011!

I have trouble starting blog posts. I start writing them in my head, no problem, and then I decide to sit down and actually type one out, and… my mind blanks on how to start. Which is weird because once upon a time I knew how to start blog posts just fine. And then I forgot, I guess.

Anyway, it’s time to reflect back on 2010 and think about what’s to come in 2011. I love this. I love looking back and counting up my accomplishments (and, er, failure-ish things) and imagining how awesome beginning a new year will be. That’s probably why I love the beginning of the submission process, when your shiny new book that might be full of accomplishments first goes out into the world and you imagine how much opportunity and success you might have. You know, that moment right before all the rejections come rolling in.

2010 was a strange year. My horoscope said it was going to be my golden epoch year, or something like that. Either way, it certainly didn’t turn out like I expected. I’ll be honest with you. I thought I would sell books this year. I thought I would be under contract again by now, and I’m not. Not being under contract kind of makes the day your book comes out feel like the day you officially become unemployed, or at least it did for me. And it wasn’t for lack of trying or hard work or submitting. Sometimes thems are just the breaks! So, not the year I expected, but one full of changes, hurdles jumped, and accomplishments accomplished.

This year I:

1. Wrote a book. It was historical. And 1st person. And that person was someone famous. NEVER thought I could write historical books, or especially one about someone real who everybody knows about, and especially not in 1st person. And, yeah, it’s more like Xena than it is HBO’s Rome or whatever, but still.

2. I got glasses. I’ve been avoiding glasses for years, and it turns out they’re not so bad. And mine look awesome, thanks to my friend Matthew who helped me pick them out.

3. I sold movie option rights for Renegade X to Disney Channel Movies.

4. My book came out! It was not the grand explosion I pictured it to be when I first sold. Selling the book was an amazing moment, definitely the high point, and then by the time it comes out you’ve already used up all your excitement energy. Imagine waiting to open your Christmas presents for two years. Even though one of them is obviously shaped like the bicycle you wanted, after staring at that bicycle shaped wrapping paper for two years, some of the thrill has faded. But still–book came out! Awesomesauce! Random people I’ve never met have read my book! Words that I have written have been to places I haven’t.

5. I went to NYC for the first time ever, to go to BEA. (Hopefully not the last!) I was terrified to go, but it ended up being AMAZING. One of my best adventures.

6. I went to CA to visit relatives and ended up at a Roman Villa. (I know, right?)

7. I moved to a new city. Moving was absolute hell, but I LOVE it here!

8. I applied to grad schools. Three of them. I’ve been thinking about it for years, but this time I finally did it, even though it was hard and complicated. Or at least seemed that way in the beginning. But I took a big long test I spent weeks studying for, I asked people for (and got) letters of recommendation, and I even wrote an essay about myself. (About going to NYC despite being terrified of it and then having the time of my life.)

9. I made huge revisions to aforementioned book, even though there were times when I didn’t think I’d be able to figure out the new ending and get it back on submission.

Oh, yeah, and I got a Nook, which is one of my favorite things EVER. I went from a hardcopies-forever book snob to a die hard convert, once I found out that ereaders had e-ink and weren’t back lit. I still love paper books–some of my favorite books are made of paper–but boy do I lurve this Nook!

So anyway, that was 2010, the year of big changes and unexpected accomplishments. What does 2011 have in store?

These things:

1. Lots of waiting. This is a given, as an author, but this winter/spring my book should be going back out on submission AND I will be waiting to hear back about grad school admissions. It’s a good thing I don’t bite my nails, but maybe I should start.

2. Hopefully starting said grad school in the fall. Hopefully at my top choice. Hopefully I will get into all three and then can spend a few weeks pretending to contemplate which one I’m going to choose and can whine and ramble on to anyone within hearing distance.

3. Writing more books! I’m not afraid to admit to you that I’ve been slacking off. (Just as long as you’re not, you know, an industry pro. Or judgmental.) I haven’t meant to slack off, but little fears and doubts have slithered their way through the cracks and invaded my brain a little bit. Also naps. But I have two–count then, TWO–awesome books I am working on. Last year I’d wanted to finish two projects, but only finished one. (Though I did finish it twice, if that counts.) This year I think my goals will be more focused on writing every day, not on how many projects I finish. (Having “finished product” as a goal is hard. Having “write every day” as a goal is only kinda hard.)

4. This year, I’m going to be more laid back. (Yeah, I know, you’ll believe it when you see it.) I have stress and anxiety issues. I sometimes always feel like someone’s going to come into my house and beat me to death with a stick if I don’t do all the dishes. Even though, in reality, if I don’t do the dishes, the biggest consequence is… there are dirty dishes. And maybe nothing to eat off of, but that’s why pizza places were invented, no need for sticks. So, laid back it is.

This post is getting long, so I’ll stop here. I do hope to blog more next year–this year my posts were kind of scarce–but I make no promises. The new me is too laid back for promises! But anyway, I hope everybody has a good year. Go forth and read lots!

WIPs

So I’d promised myself I’d finish my Shades of Rome revisions before Monday, and when I’d only written 700 words over a period of three days, I was kind of doubting that it was going to happen. But I was DETERMINED, and so Sunday–thanks to copious amounts of chocolate and naps–I pulled off another 7k, and that, combined with recycling a scene or two from the old version, got me to the end. *WHEW* And OMG, it’s done!!! And I’ll be sending it to my agent very soon!!!! And then after the holidays it will go back on submission!!!!!!

The book is a lot better this time around (The Spouse has confirmed it, so I know it’s not just me). It’s also not the most historically accurate historical fiction ever made (it’s kind of like Xena, except more like Supernatural), but I stayed as accurate as I could, plus it’s based on stuff that really did happen, even if the parts about ghosts and stuff maybe didn’t so much happen. (If you’re just tuning in, or, like me, you can’t always remember what everybody’s book is about, Shades of Rome is a paranormal YA about Julius Caesar, age 16, having to team up with Cicero to save Rome from an army of ghosts. There’s also some feisty romance, though not between those guys.) It’s a fun book and I kind of thought I’d never get through revisions, but, lo and behold, it is DONE.

I have to say, there are a lot of things that you “get over” in the world of book publishing, but finishing a book (or even hefty revisions of a book) NEVER gets old. It’s always the most awesome feeling in the world.

Now I’m onto my middle grade detective book, which doesn’t have a title. Except I’m kind of scared to work on it, and even though this is November and is nano month and avoiding writing because I’m scared is really lame and goes against the spirit of nano, it is, nevertheless, still hard. I have 5600 words in it so far, which is about 1100 words more than I remembered having, so helpful writing elves must have taken pity on me and stuck an extra scene in there one night, but however it happened it’s good to have accomplished more than I thought. I mean, I thought I had 4500 words, and since it turned out I had more than that, it’s *like* I wrote those 1100 words, so I might as well pat myself on the back and close up the file for the night.

Um, yeah, no. (Kids, don’t be like me. Or at least don’t be like me when I’m pretending finding 1100 words is the same as writing them. I mean, I did write them, just not recently.) I don’t know why I’m scared to work on this book. Mostly I think because it still feels like a new project, and it’s awesome.

But on the bright side, I must actually think I’ll get to work on it soon, otherwise I wouldn’t be blogging about it. Instead I’d be all, “Oh, guys, I’m TOTALLY working on this book. I’m, like, going to make so much progress on it. Progress like YOU WOULDN’T (read: shouldn’t) BELIEVE!” So the fact that I’m like, “Waaah! Book scary!” is probably a good sign.

Website stuff

So you might have noticed that I added a new Renegade X frequently asked questions page. Hopefully that clears up some confusions people have had and answers the age old question, “Will there be a sequel?” Which I know is the only reason anyone comes to this site, hence the reason I have kept the answer seeeekrit, my precioussss. Actually, the answer is not a secret and I haven’t been withholding it to lure people into checking out my site in the hopes of finding answers. (Sadly, there are no sequel plans at this time.)

If you have any other questions not answered on the FAQ, feel free to ask them! If enough people ask them, I will add them to the FAQ and then every time you look at that particular question, you can sit back and take pride in knowing you helped put it there. It’s kind of like naming a star, only not. At all. But you can still feel good about it.

Genre, Save the Cat! style

So this probably won’t surprise anyone else out there, but it surprised me. Today I learned that I write Superhero novels. (Yeah, I’ll pause for you to say, “Um, no duh.” Except people probably don’t say no duh anymore.) But the reason you might not be surprised is that you ONLY know of the superhero novel I wrote, and not all the others. You don’t know which ones I loved and which ones I hated and what they had in common or didn’t or whatnot.

I’ve been reading Blake Snyder’s Save the Cat! screenwriting books. (LOVE them, btw. And I don’t love a lot of writing books.) He has ten movie genres he’s defined that cover pretty much any kind of story. (Note that I don’t like a lot of writing books, but the ones I do like are about story.) Well, anyway, I’ve been reading the second STC! book and trying to figure out which genre I write, because it doesn’t seem to be any of these, and while I think my books are good, if they don’t fit into a structure, then I’m missing something, whether it’s in the books or just in my inability to figure it out.

I get to the last chapter in the book, which is about the “Superhero” story. Basically this type of story has three things: a “power” or “mission” that makes the MC super/more than human, an equally powerful nemesis, and an Achilles heel or some kind of weakness. Well, even though some people have said Renegade X isn’t like other superhero stories they’ve read, it also IS because it has all these things. But that’s one’s easy, because, duh, it’s a story about actual superheroes (and villains).

But my latest novel, Shades of Rome, which isn’t literally about superheroes like that, is still a Superhero story. It has an MC that’s given both a power and a mission, an enemy made equally powerful by the same power and an opposite mission, and a key weakness the MC has that hinders said mission.

!!!!!

Yeah, I was pretty ecstatic when I realized I have a story type. Because, you see, recently I’ve been trying to figure out WHY I love writing some books, while writing other types of books bore me to tears (even if the end product might come out good for either one). I definitely love combining the real world with some kind of fantasy element. If the fantasy element is too weak, though, I get bored. I like to have everyday family and relationship drama, yet I need something BIGGER (and, well, just plain fun) to give the story focus and keep it interesting for me. (Note that I read all sorts of books that I love, yet would hate writing. I love reading purely contemporary books, yet writing them not so much.)

So, some of the books I didn’t enjoy writing so much were maybe not balanced right. They were too real world, or they were too fantasy world. But they definitely weren’t Superhero stories. And all the books I LOVED writing were. COINCIDENCE?!?! (A clue: No.) (Yes, I make Sheriff of Nottingham references. What are you going to do about it?)

That’s my big revelation of the day. I write Superhero stories. Good to know, right?

Ideas

I keep meaning to have more non-writerly posts (or, you know, just more posts in general), but then I think no one wants to hear about my mild-yet-mysterious foot pain, or how everyone at the grocery store smells and stands in front of the milk right when I need it, or what a success it was making gravy with TWO packets instead of one the other night. SNORE.

So anyway, today I thought I’d talk about where ideas come from. Because this is something that non-writers often ask, expecting it to be something cool. Possibly even a Sekrit. And sometimes I can pinpoint the exact moment an idea really came to me, and that can be cool. But usually it’s not so glamorous or exciting.

Usually coming up with ideas is a matter of sitting down at the computer and typing until something makes sense. Which sometimes doesn’t take long at all, and sometimes takes days. Sometimes I hit on something I want to work on right away, but usually it takes a couple days of typing out nonsense to get a feel for what I might work on. And then it takes more nonsense after that to refine the idea and figure things out. If I let this process only go on in my head, not on the keyboard, then it could take months for an idea to properly form and will be pretty undeveloped. Not that there’s never any point where I’m only thinking about potential stories, not hashing things out on the computer, but it’s not how work gets done.

I think everyone has their own methods for how they get the work done, but in my case what generally works for me is sitting down and working the keyboard until some sort of order appears in the chaos. Then I outline it. It’s not glamorous or awe inspiring, but it works.

I wrote a book and other updates

I suppose since this is my blog and since finishing a book is a big deal, that maybe I should, you know, mention it on here. I *did* mention what I was doing after finishing–i.e. wandering aimlessly and having no purpose in life–but I haven’t talked *about* the book. Did I even mention I was writing one? I don’t even remember–the last couple months are a huge blur. But, I mean, a few years down the road, you might be holding said book in your hands and going, “Wow–I want to know more about how this book was made. I want to read all her blog posts where she talked about the agony of writing it and the brilliant moments where everything came together and just… how and why and when.” (I have these thoughts when I read books. Don’t judge.) And you will look and… there won’t be any. >:/

I put that angry face there, but really of course it’s my fault if there aren’t any blog posts. And really I don’t want to talk about the book. Why? I spent three months on it. Three months might not sound like a lot of time, but this is, you know, all day every day for three months. I’m clocking in at least 700 hours on this, and that’s not anything to enter into lightly. It’s my tenth finished book (there are way more than ten unfinished ones *ahem*), and I love it very much.

And it’s also probably the greatest undertaking I’ve ever undertaken, so thinking about it also makes me all kinds of nervous. (It feels kind of good to admit that. *phew*) You know I majored in Latin, yes? Scisne me Latine dicere? Sic? Well, good. So, um, I wrote a historical. (Yes, I know, it’s “an” historical, but whatever. I already told you I majored in Latin–how stuffy do you want me to sound?) And it’s set in ancient Rome, which I have studied a lot. Sort of. I had to study it a lot more to write the book, and I had to do Research, with a capital R. Lots and lots of Research. I am not a research person, but this book was special and important and I had to, so I did. (And for the record, I enjoyed it and learned lots of cool things.) I also don’t write historicals, or paranormals, or books with real people in them. And I especially don’t write them in first person.

But, um, I did. I wrote a paranormal historical set in ancient Rome (84 B.C., towards the end of the Republic) involving some of my heroes fighting ghosts, natch, and my Latin teacher will probably barf when she reads it and that’s something I’ll just have to live with. Somehow. It’s also probably the best idea I’ve ever had and right now it’s called DEAD ROMANS and I am a-freaking-mazed that I wrote it and the dialog is pretty snappy and the characters are fun if I do say so myself and it’s got real events interwoven with completely made up–but based on what *could* have happened–paranormal stuff. And even if I can point to those 3 months/700 hours and say “That’s when I wrote it,” really it represents a cumulation of years of my life. Years of study and reading and thought and love and mixing ancient ideas and ideals with modern ones and mashing it all up into a fine stock for awesome sauce.

So, you know, it’s BIG. And while I love it, I don’t know yet if it’s good or not, and neither option would make it less scary, so it kind of doesn’t matter. I’m at the point where there is too much room to think about maybes and what ifs and OMG I WROTE THAT?!? So my coping method is to just not think about it at all. Which is easier said than done, and also very weird. I mean, I spend 3 months on something, and one day I’m working on it and it’s pretty much my life, and then the next day I’m not working on it anymore and I’m not thinking about it and it’s just over.

But like I said, that’s how I’m coping, so it’s all right. I’m taking some relaxation time and letting new ideas drift in while I wait to hear what my agent thinks of it.

***

And now for the other updates, which don’t seem nearly as important after all that. But they would seem even less important if I gave them their own post, so here they are.

I got Disney contracts today! W00T! They came through the e-mails and I had to print them out and get them notarized. It was all very official and the guy at the bank had to stamp a giant seal on them. They are now sitting in a plain manilla envelope (one I bought a million years ago for sending out query letters, back before I realized folding them wasn’t grounds for rejection and before e-queries were all the rage). On my nightstand on top of a pile of library books and research books for latest novel (see above), there is a very plain envelope that you would never think had anything important in it, but it has something very much the opposite of not important inside. It has, like, these important papers for this thing I never thought would happen to me. Crazy, yes? O__o (Yes.)

Also, I finally had an eye exam and my glasses should be coming soon. I’ve probably needed them for a long time, but I refused to give in. But the aforementioned 700 hours of computer and reading time have done me in and I can’t pretend I don’t need them anymore, because I get eye strain something fierce and it’s just not worth it. I mean, what am I trying to prove? That I can have headaches every day? -__- I can’t wait for the glasses to get here, and then there will definitely be pics.

Le sigh – a.k.a. book aftermath

So, I finished the novel I was working on. The last three months blew by in a blur of frantic research and worry and pounding out word counts and now that it’s done I get to wake up for a while and be a real person who showers on a regular basis and changes her clothes once in a while. There was that moment of OMG I FINISHED IT! when I got through the first draft, and then again when I got through the revisions. There was a beautiful, sparkly moment where all the months of hard work culminated in something awesome and now I’m like, “Wow, did I really write THAT novel? But… I never thought I would, and can you imagine, ME, writing one of those?”

But after spending months thinking about how great it will be when the book is DONE, that’s D. O. N. E. FINISHED, I have to say it’s never all it’s cracked up to be. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I couldn’t be more thrilled about being DONE and having a book with a beginning, a middle, and an end to send to my agent and to have under my belt. And I am glad to have a break. But… Not having anything to work on is kind of unsatisfying. Reading, playing video games, watching shows guilt free, and even catching up on much needed chores is all fairly meaningless. Because if at the end of the day I’m getting ready for bed and have no word count, then how do I measure my worth? How do I know how satisfying the day was? There’s a certain fulfillment that comes with creating. I could miraculously burn through my entire TBR pile, and I’d still think, “But what did I DO today?”

It’s a purposeless existence, being in between books. It’s like being a knight with no dragons to slay. But it’s also good to take a break, and another book could strike at any moment, so I’d better get everything else done while I can.