The perils of the first book

There comes a point when writing your first book when a sense of something starts to take hold. It’s the sense of a slow realisation of just how much work is involved when writing a book.

I think it’s something that hits all of us at some point in the writing of that first book. No matter how well you have prepared beforehand, no matter how much you have read or how many smaller things you have written before, it always comes of something of a shock – even when you are half-expecting it.

Writing a book really is a lot of work. When you think about it in an abstract sense, it sounds like a lot but it’s also quite easy to make it sound fairly manageable. You write a draft. Then you read the draft. Then you edit it and perhaps re-write some of it. Then you edit it again. Then you try and publish it. Lots to do, but a clear order to things.

Then it actually happens. Then you actually have to deal with the reality of four different plot threads and loads of different characters and a story that, at some point during the first draft, veered somewhat off-piste from the original plan and that never quite makes it back to where it’s supposed to be. Everything suddenly becomes that bit more complicated. You start to think that you have no idea what you are doing, and that you are possibly slightly crazy, not least because despite the fact the book is a mess, you are continuing with it regardless.

In a way, all of this is a very good thing. If a book is simple to write, it may well be because it is a simple, not particularly good, book. If it is hard to write then it might be a big mess but at least there is a story there to actually be messy in the first place. In a strange way, it can give us hope.

Plus, the fact that you carry on even when faced with colossal plot holes and a sense of confusion pervading every new paragraph just goes to show how much you want to write a book. You carry on because it is something you have to do, because it is teaching you new things, because you have a story you want to tell and because it could be the start of something rather wonderful.

And also because you know just how great it will be once you make it to the end. Because it is. Getting to the end of that first book is a brilliant feeling. The sleepless nights, cancelled plans and newly-acquired caffeine habits are all worth it to have the satisfaction of having written a book of your very own.

It’s so worth it, in fact, that the only thing left to do is to get on with the business of writing book two.