Are We There Yet?

I’ve spent the last few years finishing two books. They took forever to write. And by forever, I mean I avoided them as much as possible, consequently stretching out their completion. I just wasn’t feeling “writerly.” Not blocked, mind you, oh no. Can’t admit to that. But I will admit to discouraged. Publishing can be a rather pernicious enterprise, and it’s easy to feel adrift.

When I did feel the muse’s tentative tap on my shoulder, I was lured away by a bright shiny new thing. Then I felt guilty, and didn’t work especially hard on anything except my garden.

I’ve always had pretty good reviews, but I read somewhere the “average” writer makes less than $5000 a year. Thankfully, I can top that comfortably, though I’d never be able to support myself comfortably, LOL.  But I’ve never been in it for the money anyway, which is a good thing because now I have to spend some.

This year I’m finally going to get those finished books “out there,” which means some expense for cover design and formatting. And although the books have been edited, I am going through them for the umpteenth time and have discovered they have not been edited enough.

When will it be enough? Hard to say. It seems I am an inveterate tinkerer, never content to leave good enough—or average enough—alone. I’m not talking about typos and punctuation, but content. This is why I don’t read my books after they’ve been published. I always want to change a phrase or add a scene I didn’t think of, or even, Heaven forfend, strike out entire purposeless paragraphs.

Apparently, I do not know when to stop. I’m not sure what this says about my character—perfectionism? Perseverance? Persistence? Those words sound rather grand, but it’s more like me beating a dead horse. I don’t want to kill the life out of these books by being overly fussy. But as an example, I just looked up synonyms for fussy.

Obsessive might work.

So, wish me and the barely-alive pony luck. I’ll keep you posted when Lady May makes her long-delayed debut!

How do you know The End is really The End? As a reader, do you ever want to “fix” a book? Do mistakes drive you crazy? I get bothered if words repeat too close together.

Maggie’s website