Writing in the Real World
A few days ago I finished the first draft of what will be my tenth novel. I took a few hours off and the next morning began work on the story edits of what will be book number nine. Next week I’m going to be reviewing the galleys for book number eight. This is a dream come true; it’s what I’ve spent the last twenty-five years practicing for; to be an author with a steady stream of books being published and people finding enjoyment reading them.
The challenge for me is that all of this writing takes place not in the fictional world where authors retreat to the woods, or to a sea side resort in the Bahamas’ to pen their masterpiece, but amid the chaos and distracts of everyday life.
This morning I was working through the edits on The Glacier Gallows; this will be the fourth book in the Cole Blackwater series. The story edit process is a tough one. I have an amazing editor who knows my work well and helps me craft and hone each story. I write the book, but she keeps me from getting bogged down, repeating myself, or from making some egregious procedural mistakes with my crime fiction.
The Glacier Gallows has been a pretty easy edit so far. I have to re-write a few sections, but for the most part things are moving along well. That said, it does require concentration, and when I’m deep into the story, it’s sometimes hard to extricate myself to deal with the world around me.
So it was this morning. The boys needed supervision and there were logistics to be sorted out and all I really wanted to do was stay absorbed in what I was doing. Returning to the real world from the fictional one didn’t go well. I wasn’t at my best.
But that’s the way it’s got to be. I don’t have the luxury of being able to disappear four or five times a year to pen first drafts and do story edits. And I wouldn’t want to miss my real world for anything. Every morning is a blessing; to wake to find I have a healthy, beautiful family, a full-time job making the world a better place, and the ability to venture out into the surrounding mountains to ride, run or ski. Sure, these things require me to parse out my time transfixed by the imaginary world of my characters, my essays, and my photography, but they are what fuels my creativity, and I couldn’t have one without the other.
