Devil in the details
I am full of self-doubt.
Okay, let’s take a step back.
When I first start out writing a chapter, or even a paragraph, I have most of it laid out in my head or on a piece of paper or in EverNote so I can stay on task. And it’s awesome. Everything about that chapter or paragraph is amazing and wonderful and I want to rename my first born after it. It’s like that for a lot of pieces in my writing puzzle, and if it isn’t right the first time … I edit it to death until it’s perfect for the moment and I can move on to the next one.
Until I finish a project and edit the entire thing. Then I am a failure and everything sucks and I change my daughter’s name back to what we originally named her.
Right now, though, I’m stuck. I finished writing To Hold on Nov. 19 and still haven’t completed the first round of edits because 1) I haven’t had more than an hour at a time to sit and work and 2) every time I do sit and reread/edit I feel like everything I touch turns to shit. Absolute shit. I know it’s because I’ve read all of this book a dozen times already and since I’ve read it so many times it all sounds blah and passe and overdone.
Like an idiot I worry about what readers will think, what a blogger might think, what my best friend will think, how my mom will react (which is stupid because there’s way less sex in this than the first one and my mom is well accustomed to my use of the word “fuck”), how anyone who has ever been in an abusive relationship or therapy will react, how anyone who has ever tried to drink away a bad day will react to certain scenes, how anyone who has ever been in love will try to dissect the pace of this romantic adventure Stephanie and Max are put on.
This book is slow. This book is not wishy-washy, though. This book tries to make sense of one girl’s thoughts and feelings and inadequacies. She’s a runner (both literal and figurative) and she doesn’t just succumb to the wonderful ways Max treats her. She worries she’s not good enough. She worries she doesn’t measure up, a lot.
But so. Does. He. He isn’t perfect. (Nor is he an alpha, so let me just put that out there now before people get their hands on this book and bitch about how they like their heroes to always have the upper hand. Just … stop).
In 84,000 words I attempt to take two bitter, angry, and broken people and piece them back together. I give them to each other because one can make the other a better person. The fictional nature of their “being” or their relationship doesn’t matter. Sometimes we find the most strength in those who are most broken.
