Eating Your Vegetables

The editing process is attacking me again.

I've always, always said that if a book is like a meal, writing it is the main course. It's the part you spend the most time on, it takes the most work, it does the most for you. Reading it is like the dessert. It's not particularly the best thing for you to be doing (why read your own books, shouldn't you be writing more?), but it's fun to do, and it's probably the thing others enjoy the most, too. But in the five-course meal that is a complete novel, editing is eating your vegetables.

I didn't eat my vegetables as a kid. Even as an adult, I have to smother my veggies in the rest of the food so I can barely taste it. (I like most things that go in a salad; I neither like nor dislike corn; I think beans are all I need to make a case for the presence of evil in the world.) I sat at the table long after my parents were done, toying with whatever vegetables my mom decided I needed in my system that evening. I would ask how many bites I needed to eat before I could be excused; I would negotiate, trying to get an exact measurement for a bite (is it any wonder I'm essentially a pre-law student in college?); I would beg, plead, and get theatrical, but I wasn't allowed to get up from the table until I ate those vegetables.

It's the same with writing. I love writing. It's such an essential part of myself that everything else I do in life is incidental; my life is reckoned in terms of my writing. And, as uncomfortable as it makes me at first, I love letting people read what I write. Why else do I write it? I get quite a lot out of the written word, I want to try and emulate that and give that to others. But the only way to get from writing something to letting others read it is that bane of my existence, editing.

Editing is difficult. I don't like to do it. I cringe whenever I come across a particularly bad sentence. It's unsettling to come across word choice that upsets the rhythm and flow of my work. I waffle on tenses; should I use he was sitting in the chair to make it seem more immediate or he sat in the chair to make it more emphatic? I trace threads of the plot from where they were first laid out to where they fizzle because I forgot about them, I pick them up and reconnect them, I gut whole sections of the novel, sometimes completely eradicating a character from the storyline... (There's a pernicious figure who had nothing more than a cameo appearance in Seafear whose role didn't expand in Stormsong, so he'll have to go the way of Old Yeller. It's a shame, I kind of liked him and that means there's at least 30 pages I need to completely rewrite.)

I don't like to edit. But I want people to read my book. And they can't read my book until I edit it. So onward I plow, trying to make this thing fit for human consumption. Er, reading. Whatever.

Don't eat my books, please.

The Importance of a Clear Head

I got another rejection letter the other day, but this one was (moderately) personalized, not just a form. Unfortunately, the message essentially said "This isn't what publishers are buying right now, sorry."

That really got to me. Actually, let me rephrase that: That is really getting to me, because it's a perfect articulation of the nagging doubts that have been lurking in the back corners of my skull. Though the word "unsellable" was never once said, my brain took that idea and ran with it, extrapolating on it. "This isn't what publishers are buying" turned into "this is unsellable" turned into "my writing isn't any good, nobody would ever pay for it."

It's left me hypercritical of my own writing, to the point where I feel physically ill when I even glance at a few words thrown together. "That's too sparse. That's too wordy. Who the hell thought those words should sit next to each other?" One of the benefits of being a writer is this: You are so connected to the words, to the language, that you automatically know when something sounds right and when something is... off. I have a pretty decent sense for this when I'm writing first drafts and editing them for second ones; I can tell when something works and when something doesn't.

But not now. Now, all that I see is a jumbled mishmash of broken sentences and incomplete thoughts, immature imagery, too many adverbs, and an incoherent storyline. I see any of my made up words and my stomach contracts, nausea courses through my body and I want to go do something else.

I haven't touched Seaquel in two weeks. I was going to get around to finishing Chapter Fourteen, but in the period between finishing Chapter Thirteen and starting Chapter Fourteen, I've gotten five rejection letters. It's enough to put a damper in anyone's ego and drive, and it's left me, as I've said, hypercritical.

I know it's all baloney when it boils down. I know this is all something in my head. Though I am quite often a keen judge of my own work, I've let this spate of rejection -- especially the last one -- get to me, get under my skin, to the point where I've lost my stuff. I'm sprawled on the floor next to my broken ego, and though it's still there, waiting to be put back together, I can't quite force myself to go forward with anything right now.

Once my head clears, everything will be fine.

Writer's Block

The pithy answer to "What is writer's block?" is "There's no such thing."

This is, ultimately, true. There is no such thing as a disease that prevents you from sitting down and writing. A lot of times, it's a case of lazy. It's when you suddenly realize there are an unlimited number of websites out there, a whole lot of video games to play, friends to talk to, TV to watch, blog posts to write, et cetera, et cetera. Writing on the computer is a dangerous habit, because (for me at least) Facebook inevitably opens.

I've had a hard time making headway in Seaquel lately. (Yes, I'm still being coy about the title. Shut up.) After my last rejection, I've been feeling down about the prospects of Seafear, and it's very hard to force yourself to write when you feel like you can't. I know it's bullshit that I feel that way; both agents who looked at my book said they enjoyed it. But I still worry that it's not going to prove fruitful.

Then I remind myself that I put two years of my life into this thing. On the 25th, the complete manuscript of Seafear will be a year old. On August 15, the story itself turns two. I've put too much into this to be stymied by the inevitable rejection letters that come before that sweet, elusive acceptance letter.

So I'm telling myself I have writer's block right now, because I can't get much done with Seaquel. My poor merry band of pirates have been standing around in a dark corridor for almost two months now, and they really would like to move on with their mission. I'm tantalizingly close to passing 200 pages, which will feel like an accomplishment, so I have reason to write. But I have a severe case of scared and self-doubt (not to mention a little bit of lazy).

The lazy is definitely showing through. After all, there were four seasons of The West Wing to watch when I came home from school, plus plenty of hours to play the Sims 3, and three separate video games that required my immediate and undivided attention.

I need to get back to work. Starting next week, no more nonsense.