Writing Update

Right around April Fool’s Day, I realized I’d spent the past two months writing the wrong book.

That whole plan to get the first draft done during the month of March? Yeah, not so much. The house came down with the plague, I spent three days at a convention, and oh yes, I was writing the wrong book!

That’s a hard call to make. Every time I write a book, there are parts where I feel frustrated and stuck. I wonder whether I’ve gone off the rails. Am I going to reach the end of this manuscript and realize I’ve finally lost whatever writing ability I once had? Etc., and so on. It’s normal. Unpleasant, but normal.

This was different. This was the gradual realization that the setup I’d created would not work for the kind of story I wanted to tell. Both the characters and the plot were wrong for the humor and tone I wanted.

So I scrapped it.

Yeah, it hurt.

I’m trying to tell myself I haven’t wasted two months of work. I can reuse some parts and pieces from those two months: worldbuilding, character ideas, bits of description, and so on. And I did check a couple of other things off my To Do list, like an essay for FenCon, or adding a Speaking Engagements page to my website. That’s gotta count for something, right?

Ah well. So I’m back to square one. Again. But I think I’m getting closer to what this book needs to be. Hopefully it will all pay off late next year when it comes out.

In the meantime, I’ve got a chapter to finish…