What Matters
In a poem, every word matters.
In a short story, every sentence matters.
In a novel, every paragraph matters.
Years ago when I first started writing seriously I read something like that, and it's stuck with me to this day. I'd only been writing short stories and poems, then. I had a thought for a novel (which turned out to be my first novel, There are Reasons Noah Packed No Clothes ) but I'll admit that even the *idea* of writing a novel was scary to me. At that time I think I'd written maybe 4 or 5 solid short stories, the set that got me accepted to 2 different MFA writing programs. (I ended up not going to either for personal reasons; that's another story altogether.) So, I was confident in my fiction-writing abilities--maybe too cocky, looking back on it--but, still, the thought of writing a novel. Man. I didn't know if I could pull it off.
Now, I've been writing my second novel, Dusk and Ember in earnest since the beginning of this year. That's after a few fits and false starts over 2013. And that's after it had been lying fallow for a number of years. I think I started D&E soon after I thought I'd finished Noah, somewhere around 2005 or 2006. Then things started getting in the way. My second book Escaping from Reality Without Really Trying ; digging back into writing and publishing poetry, which took up much of 2008 onward; getting my masters degree in information management (from 2009 to 2012); being a dad; being a partner/boyfriend. Neither of those least.
So what matters?
Plowing ahead. One thing at a time. One word at a time, if it's a new or the reworking of a poem. One paragraph at a time, if it's my novel. One paragraph at a time. I keep plowing it, pushing it.
In the current version I have about 140 pages. Maybe the first 40 or so are semi-solid; they won't move around too much, I think, at this point. But I don't really know. Past page 40 there's lots of material. I know where it's going. Sort of. The grey wax figures, the characters in my head when I'm writing, know about as much or more than I do. I watch for what they're doing; where they want it to go, too. I have another 200+ pages of Extra Material I call it, which may or may not ever be in the novel, ever see the light of day. That's alright. It matters to me. It matters to me when I work through it, picking through it, sifting out things I might re-use, re-purpose, or just lift out entirely.
So many lines are lost. So many words are lost.
Plow ahead. Plow ahead.
In a short story, every sentence matters.
In a novel, every paragraph matters.
Years ago when I first started writing seriously I read something like that, and it's stuck with me to this day. I'd only been writing short stories and poems, then. I had a thought for a novel (which turned out to be my first novel, There are Reasons Noah Packed No Clothes ) but I'll admit that even the *idea* of writing a novel was scary to me. At that time I think I'd written maybe 4 or 5 solid short stories, the set that got me accepted to 2 different MFA writing programs. (I ended up not going to either for personal reasons; that's another story altogether.) So, I was confident in my fiction-writing abilities--maybe too cocky, looking back on it--but, still, the thought of writing a novel. Man. I didn't know if I could pull it off.
Now, I've been writing my second novel, Dusk and Ember in earnest since the beginning of this year. That's after a few fits and false starts over 2013. And that's after it had been lying fallow for a number of years. I think I started D&E soon after I thought I'd finished Noah, somewhere around 2005 or 2006. Then things started getting in the way. My second book Escaping from Reality Without Really Trying ; digging back into writing and publishing poetry, which took up much of 2008 onward; getting my masters degree in information management (from 2009 to 2012); being a dad; being a partner/boyfriend. Neither of those least.
So what matters?
Plowing ahead. One thing at a time. One word at a time, if it's a new or the reworking of a poem. One paragraph at a time, if it's my novel. One paragraph at a time. I keep plowing it, pushing it.
In the current version I have about 140 pages. Maybe the first 40 or so are semi-solid; they won't move around too much, I think, at this point. But I don't really know. Past page 40 there's lots of material. I know where it's going. Sort of. The grey wax figures, the characters in my head when I'm writing, know about as much or more than I do. I watch for what they're doing; where they want it to go, too. I have another 200+ pages of Extra Material I call it, which may or may not ever be in the novel, ever see the light of day. That's alright. It matters to me. It matters to me when I work through it, picking through it, sifting out things I might re-use, re-purpose, or just lift out entirely.
So many lines are lost. So many words are lost.
Plow ahead. Plow ahead.
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