Missing words
Silver Age is up, and for sale. I made the mistake of checking the sales on the self-publishing interface. The lesson was painful, but also valuable. Honestly, I learned a lot during that process. Not least of which is what the mastery of Photoshop can do for an artist. It's such a ubiquitous concept that I misappropriated the use of the program with the population of the skill. The fact of the matter is, it is very, very powerful and expensive software, and it allows for an incredible range of manipulation. I am not sure how yet, but I vow to do better with my cover artists in the future. I also have a better appreciation for the work publishers do. There will always be disputes, I think, but I also believe it was good to see how the other side toils.
In the mean time, I have been writing, as per usual. The novel has a handful of chapters yet, with today's drafting, and the nightmares are right on time. Several ideas mashed together the other night and a horribly, monstrous story was the result, stitched together and unable to articulate its own misery. I did not wake up in a cold sweat, but there was a chill in me, to think that I had done it all for nothing. All of that is to say, I've almost gotten it all down, and the realization that it might suck is on the moment's heals.
For completed novels, I was discouraged by the editor getting back to me with the "something's come up" email. I felt the door closing again, but the idea occurred to me that I didn't have to go through her. Maybe the other editors at the publisher would remember me. She did say they all wanted to see work from me in the future. Maybe they'll remember? They got back to me with the "we'll get back to you" email. So, on that front, I am again exercising patience. I have no way of knowing if I'm better at this than I was five years ago, or ten. If I'm being honest, it feels like I'm worse, but who really knows.
The next project is growing in my mind almost every day. I don't have anything to compare it to, but it feels really good sometimes, to be fertile with these things. The latest idea will likely usurp an older one which, while I put all available thought and effort into it, might have just been inherently flawed. I look at novels I wrote even three years ago, and the ones I'm working on and thinking about now, and I can detect certain shifts in how I go about things. I feel like I learn something new every time. Sometimes, without meaning to, I catch glimpses of the kinds of writers I want my career to emulate, and the amount of gray hair I see makes me marvel at how much I might learn by the time I get to that point. I see other things, too, that I won't comment on at this time.
This latest particular lesson revolved around missing words. On several occasions, I've had entire chapters deleted, or discovered that a given section was just headed in the wrong direction. I've scrapped, even lost, sections before, but this time around it has been much more conscious. I paced my apartment yesterday as the power flickered thinking about the unease I was experiencing about the latest drafted section. I thought about what it was not doing, and where it was leading things, what needed to happen, and how that led things in a more interesting direction. It feels like the most mindful I've been to date, and some other things clicked into place.
I hate admitting how the downs make the ups that much more satisfying.
In the mean time, I have been writing, as per usual. The novel has a handful of chapters yet, with today's drafting, and the nightmares are right on time. Several ideas mashed together the other night and a horribly, monstrous story was the result, stitched together and unable to articulate its own misery. I did not wake up in a cold sweat, but there was a chill in me, to think that I had done it all for nothing. All of that is to say, I've almost gotten it all down, and the realization that it might suck is on the moment's heals.
For completed novels, I was discouraged by the editor getting back to me with the "something's come up" email. I felt the door closing again, but the idea occurred to me that I didn't have to go through her. Maybe the other editors at the publisher would remember me. She did say they all wanted to see work from me in the future. Maybe they'll remember? They got back to me with the "we'll get back to you" email. So, on that front, I am again exercising patience. I have no way of knowing if I'm better at this than I was five years ago, or ten. If I'm being honest, it feels like I'm worse, but who really knows.
The next project is growing in my mind almost every day. I don't have anything to compare it to, but it feels really good sometimes, to be fertile with these things. The latest idea will likely usurp an older one which, while I put all available thought and effort into it, might have just been inherently flawed. I look at novels I wrote even three years ago, and the ones I'm working on and thinking about now, and I can detect certain shifts in how I go about things. I feel like I learn something new every time. Sometimes, without meaning to, I catch glimpses of the kinds of writers I want my career to emulate, and the amount of gray hair I see makes me marvel at how much I might learn by the time I get to that point. I see other things, too, that I won't comment on at this time.
This latest particular lesson revolved around missing words. On several occasions, I've had entire chapters deleted, or discovered that a given section was just headed in the wrong direction. I've scrapped, even lost, sections before, but this time around it has been much more conscious. I paced my apartment yesterday as the power flickered thinking about the unease I was experiencing about the latest drafted section. I thought about what it was not doing, and where it was leading things, what needed to happen, and how that led things in a more interesting direction. It feels like the most mindful I've been to date, and some other things clicked into place.
I hate admitting how the downs make the ups that much more satisfying.
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