This Not Me Waving. This Is Me Flailing.

[mmerriam]

I've been quiet here on LJ (everywhere, in fact). I've been trying to get a handle on some things in my writing career, trying to figure out where I'm going and what I need do to advance my career.

I made a post a little while back about the number of words I'd written (1.35 million) and sold (200,000) in the last eight years. I noted that I wasn't sure what, if anything, all those words meant. I still don't.

I attended a workshop recently. I took the opening of Dark Water Blues as my submission and offered it up for critique. I've said before that I think DWB is both the best and worst thing I've every written. I had hoped to finish working this novel over and have it ready to send out late this year.

What I found out was that the novel is broken. With a great big capital "B" Broken. One of the key points that underpins the novel from start to finish simply doesn't work. It is a logical fallacy. There were positive things about the novel, but this bit of brokenness stops the novel from working and would mean a rewrite from the floor up with major, wholesale changes. One of the important premises of the novel would have to written out, changed, and worked over to keep my two protagonists together.

I made a list of a dozen questions I would need to answer before I attempt a rewrite. I'm going to think about them over the next day or two. I'm not sure I have the energy or the heart to tackle this novel again. I'm unsure how to repair such massive damage, or even if I should. Maybe I should cannibalize the novel instead. At some point I'll need to get more outside advice about how, if possible, to fix this.

I've been having confidence trouble lately. I haven't sold any of my newer pieces of short fiction, though I can point to the fact that these new stories are slowly and surely working their way through the SFWA pro-zines, so of course I'm collecting rejection after rejection. Those stories are competing at the top end of the market right now.

The wobbly confidence has made it hard for me to finish anything. I keep falling into the second guessing trap. Unsure of my abilities, not trusting the story, I freeze. The monster-hunting barista story had stalled because of this. I need to put my head down and bull through a first draft of anything right now. I know this is the best thing I could do.

I've begun studying scriptwriting. For one thing, it would give me another creative outlet. But more important, I think it will play to the sharpest tool in my writer's toolbox: dialogue. This is the one thing I still have some confidence in, and I've been told over and over that my prose is so minimal that it seems better suited for scripts. I admit to being a minimalist at heart.

I have also taken on the lead editor position for a project, and am still reading slush. I was also advised that I should go ahead and write my Fringe Festival show. I could still get in, even though I'm low on the waiting list. It was pointed out to me that, as an individual storyteller, I could fill a late cancelation and be shoe-horned into the Fringe schedule rather easily. Take all this and add in the time I spend on my personal writing projects, and networking sites are getting ignored.

Anyway, that is why things have been so quiet around here lately.

Comments

[xjenavivex.livejournal.com]

night_sky_bliss@yahoo.com

any time for any reason

I haven't been at this long enough to hit a confident stride. Fantasy just bounced my best piece in less than 24 hours. I've read your work. I know you are a talented writer. I am so sorry the DWB is broken. I know how much you must be struggling with the next direction on that project alone. I'm here if you need to talk. You know I'm a fairly decent cheerleader. I believe in you and your work.

[mmerriam.livejournal.com]

Thank you for the kind words and encouragement. I sat and talked it out with careswen, and we think we might have figured out how to fix DWB. It will be a painful process, but it is doable.

[jongibbs.livejournal.com]

Have you considered writing a few 100-word pieces? They're by no means easy, but they're short enough that you won't have to worry about getting lost along the way.

Hope that helps :)

[mmerriam.livejournal.com]

Drabbles have always eluded me. Flash fiction and spec fic poetry, OTOH, is something I have turned to when I need the quick fix of a completed work.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I know how frustrating and unbalancing it is to realize that you have to rewrite a whole novel if you're going to have anything with it at all. I still haven't managed it with Copper Mountain. I'm really sorry to hear.

[mmerriam.livejournal.com]

There is nothing for it but start taking Dark Water Blues apart and rebuild if. careswen and I discussed the problems, and we thing we've come up with a fix. It will not be an easy fix, mind you, but a doable fix.

[jdawson001.livejournal.com]

I really do feel your pain. I am dealing with a broken novel and confidence issues, as well.

All I can suggest is doing what feels right, and get any stories you have sitting around out there circulating. Nothing helps confidence like acceptance letters. The downside, of course, are the rejection letters in the process.

I'm here if you need anything...

Jenn

[mmerriam.livejournal.com]

I made some forward movement with the monster-hunting barista story (even if it is already 10,000 words and ever growing). careswen and I talked about the problems with Dark Water Blues and it is fixable. It will hard work to make the repairs, but I can do it.

[jdawson001.livejournal.com]

Glad to hear it.

[mylefteye.livejournal.com]

I don't think there's a writer out there who doesn't feel the way you do now at least some of the time. All I can say is keep plugging away. You're good at what you do.

[mmerriam.livejournal.com]

Actually, I'm pretty much convinced that I'm pants at what I do, but since editors keep giving me money and I can't seem to stop writing (I enjoy it too much to quit), well, what else can I do but soldier on?

[kmarkhoover.livejournal.com]

The fact you realize a story is broken is pretty huge in itself. But you already know that.

I hear you on the confidence thing. Writing sucks. Pure and simple. There are lows and...well, lower lows. Few highs. Sometimes I wonder if they exist at all, haha.

I know. Talk is cheap. So is advice, especially when it comes from another writer. I've been through this, too. Not that it matters bc it's happening to you now and when it's your confidence being questioned then it hurts all the more. I went through something like this a week or so ago, and then I pulled out of it. I wish I could tell you how it happened, what I did to escape that confidence vacuum. I have no idea.

There is no magic bullet. Writing does suck canal water. It always will. Anyone who tells you different is delusional. But, like it or not, you're a writer. And, if I may say so, a pretty damn good writer.

Get back on the horse. Go write. Like you said, put your head down and bull your way through if that's what it takes. For writers, that's our only consolation...and our only hell: writing when everything is on the line, and when nothing matters. That's how crazy this all is.

Do it, buddy. Go write. The sales will come later. For someone as good as you are, that's a given. :)

[mmerriam.livejournal.com]

careswn and I talked out the problems with Dark Water Blues and we think we know what needs to be done to fix it. It is going to be a fairly painful process of taking the novel apart and rebuilding it, but not an impossible task.

[wordswoman.livejournal.com]

You came out of that workshop seeing your novel as broken...I saw it as far and away the most promising of the lot. A wow of an opening, an engaging voice, intriguing characters, perfectly paced, professionally written. If that's what you call broken, my friend, the rest of us are in big trouble. Some plot & plausibility holes? Sure, here and there. But you could fix those and *still* have a final draft faster than a lot of writers finish a first.

[careswen.livejournal.com]

I am *SO* glad you said this. I had hoped this was the case, but I haven't read the draft yet. We discussed it over lunch today, and I think we have some ideas for solving one of the holes.

[mmerriam.livejournal.com]

There is nothing for it but start taking Dark Water Blues apart and rebuild if. careswen and I discussed the problems, and we think we've come up with a fix. It will not be an easy fix, mind you, but a doable fix. I started making notes about how to plug the biggest hole and the what the ripple out effects on the rest of the novel would be. I'd say I'll still be able to use about 70% of the novel with minor tweeks. It's that 30% that needs a complete overhaul that worries me.

[a-r-williams.livejournal.com]

I think, the hardest judge of their work, often can be the creator of it. We hold in our heads an image of perfection, so far, and so high, that when we strive to reach it our grasp is destined to come up short.

I think reaching higher is where we develop the skill that improves our talent. It is something that never lets us remain comfortable, because there is always that inner voice telling us how we have failed to achieve the vision. We never succeed, if we keep trying to improve ourselves, to reach what we reach for. We make small grabs that slowly lift us from the earth and into the heavens.

It feels like we don't move, that we're still grounded the same way if you're traveling down a road you can't realize how fast you are going until you look to the side and see all the trees whizzing by.

I think, in the writing, it's very easy to lose perception. To take the forward view as a lack of progress. But the fact we doubt forces us to improve.

You're in a period where your mind is searching for the answers that will take you a little higher, to enable you to reach a little further. Such is the way an artist grows. Through little gains, through small steps, and through a great deal of self doubt.

You will make it through this period. Your writing will be stronger for it. But for you, it will feel like you're sitting in a car that isn't traveling all that fast. Just remember, you are making progress.

[mmerriam.livejournal.com]

This is a tough business we are in. The highs are high but short-lived and the lows seem to go on forever.

That said, I've hashed the situation with Dark Water Blues pout with my best advisor (my wife) and we thin we have figured out how to repair this novel. It will hard work, but I can do it.

[glynisj.livejournal.com]

You must be devastated. I know I would be. I'd have to just leave it completely alone for a few months hoping to get it out of my head before I could even consider a rewrite. My heart goes out to you. This is why I have a tendency to go for writing articles. So much easier.

[mmerriam.livejournal.com]

I talked it over with careswen, and we think we've figured out what needs to be done to repair the damage. It will be tough work, taking the novel apart and rebuilding it, but it is doable.

[queenofillusion.livejournal.com]

It was hard to read this post...I know what you mean. Been there in that same feeling time and again.

Looks like some other comments left here are saying the novel might not be broken. Sounds like you might need a second opinion (or third) before you give up on it?

Best of luck! Keep at it!

Veronica

[mmerriam.livejournal.com]

I talked it over with careswen, and we think we've figured out what needs to be done to repair the damage. It will be tough work, taking the novel apart and rebuilding it, but it is doable.

[cloudscudding.livejournal.com]

::sympathetic nod::

[mmerriam.livejournal.com]

I talked it over with careswen, and we think we've figured out what needs to be done to repair the damage. It will be tough work, taking the novel apart and rebuilding it, but it is doable.

Plus, I think I might have figured out something about my work-style, which I might talk about in a post later this week.

[mistoffo.livejournal.com]

We may need to do coffee sometime soon.

[mmerriam.livejournal.com]

Yes, I think so.