A hard week with lots of excuses for not writing:
(Plus, scroll to bottom about finding a writing group, my upcoming suspense class, Samantha Downing's manuscript graveyard, and my hope you'll find 20 minutes to write despite the horrible news)
Worry about the war in Gaza/Israel. I was good at not reading news first thing in the morning for a while, but now, with the moment of a ground offensive upon us, I keep looking for updates. I have resisted adding to oversimplified interpretations via social media, because don’t we all know it’s all tragic, no matter your political point of view?
Add to that: the tragedy in Maine, still in progress.
Physical discomfort with a minor health problem for which I am having a small procedure next week; I’ve lost sleep all week due to night-time pains.
Fascination with a book I just finished reading, as well as its author, prompting me to start googling interviews. The good stuff distracts, too!
There will always be reasons not to write. (In case you missed it in the subhead: I’m going to tell you to write anyway.)
Where has the day gone?
[Time check: 11:34 a.m.]
Your reasons for not writing today may include the bad and the good—news, family, finances, side jobs, chores. Very few of us can rely on hard deadlines and certain rewards. We have to make time to write, even knowing that each day’s writing may end up producing little—yet if we don’t check in with our stories, with our own ideas, the well dries up.
I had a self-congratulatory newsletter post ready to share with you—already written, proofread and formatted!— about a great writing week I had two weeks ago, in which my new novel gained much-needed traction. But maybe what you need to hear instead is that it doesn’t always happen. Honestly? I’d say the “oops” weeks of lost and wasted time outnumber the “yeah, baby!” weeks of productivity and purpose by two-to-one.
Day before yesterday, I had a Zoom with a coaching client who quoted back to me how I’d described my writing routine as about “three to four hours,” most days of the week. Yeah, but, I felt the need to tell her quickly. Not always. Perhaps I was describing a platonic ideal, a week in which my writing takes priority over all the other ways I make a living. It does happen. But it doesn’t have to happen that perfectly in order for books to get written and published.
(I also felt the need to tell her I balance low-productivity weeks with extremely productive albeit high-calorie writing marathons, especially when I am finishing or revising a book. But let’s be clear—the marathons, as important as they are, are not the norm. I do them maybe three to four times a year.)
Today, instead of starting my writing day at 9 am, which would have been advisable, because my mind works best before I clutter it, I’ll be starting around noon. I’ll also be delaying until Sunday a big swim workout I had planned for today, about which my husband will say, because he is a normal person and not somebody who signed up for an Ironman, “That’s okay, hon,” and I’ll say, “No, it’s not okay! It’s really not!”
Meanwhile, the dishes sit stacked in the sink, the floor is disgusting, my bureau is covered by a mixed pile of dirty and clean clothes, I haven’t read my book club’s book for next week, I have an entire forthcoming book of my own to proofread yet again (last chance for changes), and oh my god I’m leaving on the big triathlon trip in less than three weeks and just thinking about it makes my heart race. Plus: the upcoming minor medical procedure. Read those instructions!
Today will be yet another day when not everything can fit. When this happens, I pull my expectations back to the basics by selecting the three top things I need to do and the shortest amount of time I can reasonably commit to without triggering major resistance. I say, “One hour for X side job, one hour for novel-in-progress, one hour for workout or domestic to-do.”
That’s only three hours, and yet sometimes I can’t even achieve those modest goals. Sometimes, I feel like I’ve spent the entire day at the computer and I look back and can track only one hour spent truly productively, in the way I had planned, rather than on some sidetrack.
It would be different if I’d given myself a “day off.” That would be grand!
But how can it be that we spend entire days “on” without getting much done, aside perhaps from loads of email, meal prep, a podcast, reading newsletters, a bit of a freelance assignment, more email, errands?
[Time check: 11:42 a.m.]
[Time check: 11:47 a.m.]
Can you believe I just went to check email? Why did I check email?
None of this is getting me where I need to be, writing about a big day in the life of my main character—the day her teenage son is arrested. You’d think I’d be excited to find out what happens! Shouldn’t we follow her to the station? Shouldn’t we be worried that she went off a prescription and isn’t feeling very well? Shouldn’t we be worried that she can’t afford a lawyer?
Hello, author! Why aren’t you accompanying that poor woman right now, on her worst possible day? She needs you!
[Time check: 11:50 a.m.]
My late mother used to say, from about 11:00 a.m. on, “Half the day gone!” Oh, how I hated that, especially as a teenager who didn’t wake up on weekends until 9, 10, or later. Even for her, an early riser, half the day was not truly gone. It’s not like she went to bed at 5 p.m.!
But it’s how we feel, right? The day gone. The year or even the decade gone.
It isn’t.
If we have a few hours, we can write a scene. If we have an hour, we can start one. If we have only twenty minutes, we can write or we can edit or we can simply read our own work, to keep the pump primed. All of those things are important.
House of Sand and Fog author Andre Dubus III wrote his best-known book in short bursts, for about seventeen minutes at a time, parked at a cemetery on the way to and from a teaching job.
That anecdote means so much to me that having heard it several times on podcasts, I personally arranged my own phone interview with him (for a Writer’s Digest article, but really, for my own personal edification) in order to confirm it. It was true! (You’ve heard me tell this story before. I love that book and Dubus was such a nice guy during the call.)
[Time check: 11:57 a.m.]
In the time it’s taken me to write this newsletter, Andre Dubus III would have completed half of his writing day, back in the HOS&F days. Now he has more leisure and writes for several hours most mornings—supposedly! Even so, he throws away many more pages than he keeps. Still, it’s enough. For him and for us.
I’ll leave you with an Annie Dillard quote—abbreviated because noon is upon me and your task is in front of you: to spend some part of this day dedicated to your project, even just seventeen minutes, whether it is pleasing or bedeviling you.
[Time check: 12:00 p.m.]
“How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives. … A schedule defends from chaos and whim. It is a net for catching days. … It is a lifeboat on which you find yourself, decades later, still living.”
Annie Dillard
ARE YOU LOOKING FOR AN ONLINE WRITING GROUP OR BETA READER?
It can be especially hard to find new people writing specifically in your genre. Bianca Marais over at the “Shit No One Tells You About Writing” podcast (a great place to learn about effective querying, by the way) is offering another of her “BETA READER MATCH-UPS.” These only happen occasionally. I participated a while ago, when the rules were different and there was no fee, but I can report that yes, I was paired with three wonderful, smart women writers in my time zone. I’m also in a second writing group, put together by another three brilliant (and helpful!) women I met online, without a matchmaker.
Which goes to show: You do not need to restrict your writing circles to people you know in person. Reach out, mix it up, have fun. You can always quit if it’s not working for you!
(Another way to find a new group: take an online class that includes workshopping; after the class finishes, privately approach the one or two people who seem to have good critical skills, with whom you share taste in terms of genre, favorite authors, or attitude.)
WHEN DOES WRITING AND GET DO WRITING AND PUBLISHING GET EASY? NEVER, MY FRIENDS! (That was a heck of a silly typo that went out to all my subscribers. I’m leaving it here for later readers so you can see that it’s okay to make mistakes, which I should know, because I make them all the f-ing time.)
Oh, I’ve been sitting on a whole lot I want to say about getting more resilient in the face of rejection and perceived rejection or even anticipatory rejection. But a picture is worth a thousand words (cliche!) so here are two pictures that should tell us a lot!
Samantha Downing is doing well for herself. Four commercially hot books, a new Netflix announcement. So when she shared on IG that she has had to throw out FIFTEEN OF HER MANUSCRIPTS, including TWO RECENTLY, it surprised many of us.
Suspense is a particularly hard domain to crack—and even once inside its doors, publishers frequently say no to their authors’ successive ideas or full manuscripts. (Which I frankly think is kinda nuts. I am not convinced the editors are making the right choices, in all cases. Methinks they are using a bestseller-only mentality and missing some fresher ideas in the process.)
Even so, the takeaway is clear. Successful authors get rejected, scrap projects, and deal with blows to their productivity and their egos just as much as novices and mid-listers. The next time you are worrying about sending out a query or nervously awaiting your first review for your first book, think of these stats. Work on those shrugging muscles. I know that I am! You should see these shoulders! :)
A VIRTUAL SHORT COURSE IN SUSPENSE, REGARDLESS OF GENRE, NOV 4 & 11
I’m teaching for 49 Writers in November. See the class announcement here! We will spend three hours in lecture, discussion and prompt mode, and three hours workshopping. Reading examples will include both fiction and memoir.
That’s all for now, friends. May we all have less news to preoccupy us in weeks and months ahead. Take care!
A huge thanks to those of you who pre-ordered or added The Deepest Lake (Soho Crime, May 7, 2024) to your Goodreads to-read shelf, where the early reviews and ratings are just starting to roll in. Nine ratings! There are nine! (Who me? Lurking at Goodreads?)
Reviewer copies are still available at NetGalley! I love this cover so much I will probably be posting it a few times. :)
I am so so so proud that you let your house stay scurfy (and your laundry and teaching undone) in order to work on your WIP!
Spent time this afternoon on my WIP, neglecting: student essays, laundry, scurfy house, war. Did go to the grocery store but only because I needed cookies. Loved this post. Like "backstage" of a writer's life (also: signed up for Bianca's Beta group & am so curious about what will happen!) Also: hope the procedure is swift, smooth, sututre-less.