Writerly angst

[jhetley]

Just reading Peg Kerr's lament about uncertainty in the writing life. And Rolanni's grumbles over going back to rework a "done" chapter that sent the story line off in the wrong direction. And here I am with the female lead of my current work telling lies to me. I _thought_ she was a Vietnamese refugee with a father and brother in "reeducation" camps, that's what she told another character -- turns out she's born and raised in the US and just makes up romantic background stories when people ask too many personal questions. She's still a cast-iron bitch, though.

I thought this stuff was supposed to get easier with practice. I've seen three or four good reviews for WINTER OAK, including one that's _really_ important (Publisher's Weekly), and I'm still angsting over whether that damned book actually works and whether it will sell enough copies to keep Ace forking over cash for more-of-the-same-but-different. That's for words I wrote 2-3 years ago.

And if I put as much time and effort into architecture as I do into writing, we'd sure eat steak for dinner more often. With the exception of a handful of "names" in each genre, writing fiction doesn't pay minimum wage.

Maybe writing should be filed under "curse."

Comments

[rolanni.livejournal.com]

I thought this stuff was supposed to get easier with practice.

The actual putting-words-into-sentences-into-paragraphs-that-make-sense part gets easier. Unfortunately, I've found that the increase in technical ease is offset by reaching for more complicated story lines, or characters. Or both.

There's no competition like self-competition *g*

[wcg.livejournal.com]

It's a bit like teaching, isn't it? (Or at least like teaching is for me. Something I'm driven to do, love doing, but don't get paid much for doing.)

[kightp.livejournal.com]

Sometimes I think none of the really ... compelling ... stuff pays.

Come to think of it, maybe that's part of what makes it compelling. It has to be its own reason for doing, because gods know there's no "practical" reason.

So it won't put steak on the table. It puts sparkles in my brain and a thump in my heart and, once in a great while, a big ol' grin on my face.

[johnpalmer.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah.

When you look at something, and your heart is overflowing with joy, and you think "I helped bring that about!"

I don't think it ever is as good with writing as with the effects of writing, though. Sometimes, my writing seems really good, really damn good, but often it seems a bit embarrassing. But, sometimes it reaches out and touches someone and does what I wanted it to do, and that makes up for a lot of the pain in the process.

And, writing can definitely be filed under "curse" to some degree.

[kinzel.livejournal.com]

Sigh. Imagine what it was like for us to have some *old* stuff published -- say ten years old or older -- that had been rejected over and over ... like The Tomorrow Log. Then it hit the Locus Best Seller list... and there was Master Walk... which has gotten good reviews and was over a decade old when published.

I think Rolanni is right, though -- the more your write the more you try to do and the more you become your own toughest critic.

Keep on typing....

[pegkerr.livejournal.com]

I always liked that throwaway line in Megan Lindholm's "The Silver Lady and the Fortyish Man," about the life of a writer living on the financial edge: "My muse was always a fickle bitch . . . "