Writing is hard work
The Terror says to the Atlantic “Catch me if you can!”
by Christine Kling
I’ve been posting pictures on Facebook similar to the one above of me and my dog walking on the beaches of beautiful Man O War Cay in the Bahamas and some folks have been writing about what a great life I have. And indeed, it is pretty great, but that doesn’t change the fact that
Writing is hard work.
I get that it doesn’t look hard. I understand that I don’t have to put on pantyhose or drive in traffic or put up with an annoying boss (other than the Terror*). But trying to put the words together to create one scene after another, trying to decide if your character will turn right or left, travel by car or plane, kill or be kill, eat street food or go to a restaurant is hard work. Hardest of all is trying to get all the details right.
Don’t laugh. It really is.
Today I wrote two pieces other than working on my novel or this blog. One was a “conversation” between me and another author where we just chatted back and forth via Google docs. I wrote about something that I have never quite put into words before, and it got me to thinking. I wrote about this strange sort of competitive feeling I have towards men. I want to sail and write as well as men because you see, some of the writers and sailors I admire most are men. The other piece I wrote was a post in an online forum where people were writing about whether or not they read prologues. I found the conversation idiotic and I said as much. I wrote:
“If a story requires a prologue to tell it best, then use one. If it doesn’t then don’t. For heaven’s sake, don’t worry about whether or not it’s a current fad. Deciding to call a prologue chapter 1 won’t change it from being a prologue. A prologue is what it is due to the structure of the story, not the label you put on it. Here are a few books I’ve enjoyed that use a prologue to very good effect:
Peter Matthiessen’s AT PLAY IN THE FIELDS OF THE LORD.
Robert Goddard’s IN PALE BATTALIONS
Robert R. McCammon’s BOY’S LIFE
Carlos Ruiz Zafon’s A SHADOW OF THE WIND
If I could write half as well as any of them I’d be thrilled.”
In looking back at that list of books I like very much, books that are rich in accurate details, I realized, they were all by men. I consider all of those books to be both literary fiction and genre fiction, i.e. thrillers. And to be honest, I cannot think of a woman writer whom I could add to this list of authors(regardless of prologues).
And that pisses me off because it makes me realize I have a gender bias, too — and it makes me want to work even harder.
But when I am working on a scene and trying to conjure up what the people look like and what it all smells like and what they are saying and how that relates to their professions which are sometimes things I know nothing about — sometimes I despair. Who am I to create one character who is a geologist/mining engineer and another who is a chemist and then try to figure out what they would say to each other when discussing how to defeat gold fingerprinting that uses mass spectrometry? Who am I to attempt this?
That’s when I realize that my gender bias extends to me. I don’t really believe in my own ability to write the kind of books I love.
And that, my friends, makes the writing even harder.
Fair winds!
Christine
*aka Barney the Yorkshire Terror
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