First Drafts: The True Story
Dear Blog,
OK. Writing a first draft is not like sledding down a hill. I mean, it sort of is. But sometimes you realize, oops, wrong hill! And then you have to change hills. Or sometimes you hit a tree, brain yourself, and die. (That probably doesn’t happen very often to authors writing first drafts. But you never know. NaNoWriMo – National Novel Writing Month – is an extreme sport. Wear a helment)
I do love writing first drafts. Mostly. But maybe I am sugarcoating it a bit because the last time went so well and it was a long time ago too. Maybe it’s beginning a first draft that I really love. After all, I’ve abandoned drafts that stopped being fun when they just started to suck and I didn’t see my way out of or around their suckiness. I’d like to think it’s an important skill, knowing when to jump ship, but I have no idea if I was right about the ships I’ve left behind me, wrecked on strange shores I never even think about anymore. I don’t know if I was being self-aware, or just being a wimp, or lazy.
Of course, even the finished drafts I remember as so much fun to write weren’t actually fun every day. There are days when I am writing crap, and I know it, and I keep banging away at the computer thinking I am an idiot I am an idiot I am an idiot. Then when LittleK wakes up I feel like I’ve wasted my time completely and it’s hard to salvage the rest of the day. The following afternoon I put him down for his nap, open my computer, look at what I wrote, think I am an idiot, and delete the whole thing. And I call that a good day’s work.
So, I don’t really enjoy the part where I am writing worthless crap and I know it. I do, in a perverse way, sort of enjoy the savage deletion, and starting over. If only I could do that in life as well. Just wipe out the way I yelled at my three-year-old this morning, undo leaving my favourite hat at the airport, erase the stupid rambling story I tried to tell some polite new friends. Unmake that dumb comment, unget that bad haircut, do-over, do-over! But I might never get through a day that way. At least I can erase Julia’s boring account of how she fell for Wyn, and replace it with a failed robbery and their first kiss. With a story, at least, we are lucky enough to be able to keep trying until we get it right. Or right-ish.
Bad Writing Days notwithstanding, finishing a first draft is about as satisfying as it gets, for me. Of course I know the real work is about to begin, but even so: My story has an ending! Finishing edits never feels that good. I never think it’s really done, it’s just that at some point, you have to call it done, and stop.
I need to do a rewrite or seven of my spy story, and presumably at some point this winter an editor will want me to revise The Last Days of Tian Di Book 2 (I’m sure it will have a better title than that by next fall!). But right now I am getting into the thick of a sequel to my still-a-draft spy story, with beautiful blank pages ahead of me, limitless for now in their potential awesomeness. So far, so much fun. More on the process as it progresses.
Love to you, dear bloggy blog (I am getting fond of you, see), and happy NaNoWriMo,
Catherine
OK. Writing a first draft is not like sledding down a hill. I mean, it sort of is. But sometimes you realize, oops, wrong hill! And then you have to change hills. Or sometimes you hit a tree, brain yourself, and die. (That probably doesn’t happen very often to authors writing first drafts. But you never know. NaNoWriMo – National Novel Writing Month – is an extreme sport. Wear a helment)
I do love writing first drafts. Mostly. But maybe I am sugarcoating it a bit because the last time went so well and it was a long time ago too. Maybe it’s beginning a first draft that I really love. After all, I’ve abandoned drafts that stopped being fun when they just started to suck and I didn’t see my way out of or around their suckiness. I’d like to think it’s an important skill, knowing when to jump ship, but I have no idea if I was right about the ships I’ve left behind me, wrecked on strange shores I never even think about anymore. I don’t know if I was being self-aware, or just being a wimp, or lazy.
Of course, even the finished drafts I remember as so much fun to write weren’t actually fun every day. There are days when I am writing crap, and I know it, and I keep banging away at the computer thinking I am an idiot I am an idiot I am an idiot. Then when LittleK wakes up I feel like I’ve wasted my time completely and it’s hard to salvage the rest of the day. The following afternoon I put him down for his nap, open my computer, look at what I wrote, think I am an idiot, and delete the whole thing. And I call that a good day’s work.
So, I don’t really enjoy the part where I am writing worthless crap and I know it. I do, in a perverse way, sort of enjoy the savage deletion, and starting over. If only I could do that in life as well. Just wipe out the way I yelled at my three-year-old this morning, undo leaving my favourite hat at the airport, erase the stupid rambling story I tried to tell some polite new friends. Unmake that dumb comment, unget that bad haircut, do-over, do-over! But I might never get through a day that way. At least I can erase Julia’s boring account of how she fell for Wyn, and replace it with a failed robbery and their first kiss. With a story, at least, we are lucky enough to be able to keep trying until we get it right. Or right-ish.
Bad Writing Days notwithstanding, finishing a first draft is about as satisfying as it gets, for me. Of course I know the real work is about to begin, but even so: My story has an ending! Finishing edits never feels that good. I never think it’s really done, it’s just that at some point, you have to call it done, and stop.
I need to do a rewrite or seven of my spy story, and presumably at some point this winter an editor will want me to revise The Last Days of Tian Di Book 2 (I’m sure it will have a better title than that by next fall!). But right now I am getting into the thick of a sequel to my still-a-draft spy story, with beautiful blank pages ahead of me, limitless for now in their potential awesomeness. So far, so much fun. More on the process as it progresses.
Love to you, dear bloggy blog (I am getting fond of you, see), and happy NaNoWriMo,
Catherine
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