Tough Decisions, or, I'm Not a Quitter--Honest!

Being a writer means making lots of choices. Why did Uncle Melvin kill off Cousin Carl? How will Detective Haskins discover the killer? Why did Sarah run off with Luigi? And on and on...

One of the toughest things about being a writer is knowing when to quit. Not necessarily for the day, but when is the story done. Or when it's not done, and there's nothing you can do at this point in your life to make it done.

by Astroboy_71

I'm facing one of those times right now.

For the last 6 1/2 years, I've been working on a novel project. It's had a lot of names, but right now, it's "Homebody". This novel predates my children being born, and the two main characters actually predate my marriage.

Over the last year or so, I've struggled with the book. I'm on like the 7th draft or some crazy thing, and I keep feeling like I'm circling around when it could be considered done, but just not quite there. Those who have read it say the same thing. But I can't figure out what's wrong with it, not now at least. For a while, I thought it was done: I submitted it to agents, and have received a few nice, even encouraging replies, but nothing that would have me thinking I'm almost there.

In a last-ditch effort, I asked Texas Momma (aka Linda Yezak) to take a look at it this spring. Between all her battles, she read a few chapters, but life happened and she had to return it, mostly unread, but with a few very helpful suggestions.

Then, last week, I got that niggling feeling again, like it was time to let it go.

I've had that feeling off and on for a while. I'm not sure why, but after it came back stronger than ever, I decided I'd e-mail Texas Momma about it. Even though I asked, I wasn't quite prepared for the blunt reply:

"Give up on Homebody. Save the personalities for another book, if you'd like, but I'd quit on it."

My stomach clenched reading those words. This book has become so much a part of my identity the last several years. How can I just give it up? It's almost like abandoning one of my children at the grocery store.

One thing you should learn early on as a writer is to kill your darlings. In other words, that turn of phrase you think is so clever, or that scene that you love but doesn't necessarily fit with the rest of the book. Perhaps it's the same way with this book--it's become my darling in many ways.

When I first started it, I was a completely different person than I am today. I had different goals, different aspirations, different worries. And, writing... and rewriting Homebody was cathartic in many ways. In the past six years, I've started work on several other projects, most of which I've finished, one or two I haven't for whatever reason--my creative juices ran out, I lost interest, etc.

Homebody wasn't the first novel I wrote. No, that disgraceful thing happened back in my teens. I pray it never again sees the light of day. A couple more came in between, both before and after a hiatus in my last semester of college into the first year of married life. Perhaps Homebody is that transition for me--the one I needed to get out, but isn't yet worthy of being published. Perhaps the next one or two books I've got on my plate will be it. I hope so.

For now, I must say goodbye to this story. Thank you for helping me grow as a writer. I'm sorry I had to use you to do it, that you never reached your full potential, that I wasn't the writer you needed me to be. Just know that even though you will remain on my flash drive, and I may never open you again, you've been valuable. I will always have fond memories of writing you.

As for my characters, Amanda O'Flannigan and Richard "Rick" Pierce, I think they'll be around again. Almost as soon as I made the decision that it was time to cut it loose, I got a new idea which would be perfectly suited (I think) for them. And, Homebody definitely allowed me to come up with a great deal of back-story for these two. I hope it comes to fruition, mostly because I love both of these characters dearly. I'm not quite ready to quit on them, even if I have to quit on one of their stories.

For the time being, I'm going to get back to work on "Reprisal". I'm mid-way through the 3rd draft, and it's lingered far too long as I've had two children, done NaNo, and tried to get that OTHER book done. I'll try to post monthly reports, even if they're brief, on how that's going. Once I've completed the 3rd draft, I'm going to go back to my 2009 NaNo project, "Beyond Dead". It's very short--just barely over the 50K minimum to win NaNo, and ideally I'd prefer it around 80K. That's a lot of words to add! But, one thing at a time.

If you're a writer, how do you gauge when it's time to cut a story loose permanently and stop working on it? Have you ever had to do it? Did you mourn for the story and/or characters as I feel I'm doing a bit of now?

Happy trails,

A Rant on a Recent Read

The Kindle and its free books have been a boon; I'm reading genres I normally don't, by authors (and publishers) I usually don't have time for.

However, I recently read one freebie book which left me with mixed feelings.

Generally, I enjoy the books I read. If I don't, I usually continue reading them because I'm interested in the topic (these are typically non-fiction books.)

I just had that experience with a fiction book.

The book? Deeper Water by Robert Whitlow. Publisher: Thomas Nelson.

The premise: a 24-year-old, second year law student goes from her home in rural Georgia to Savannah for the summer to clerk for a large law firm and gets a practice case for a man who knows something about a 40-year-old murder.

Sounded interesting to me.

When I started the book, I was interested because the main character, Tami, turned out to be homeschooled. Huh. I hadn't seen that in a novel before. Since I was homeschooled for a time, I was interested.

Soon it became clear that her homeschooling experience and mine were vastly different.

I'm fairly conservative, however Tami and her family took that to an unknown extreme. She had to get permission to take the job from her parents, where to live, etc.

While I finished reading the book, I walked away dissatisfied. For the first time in recent memory, I hadn't liked the main character for a wide variety of reasons: Her family's beliefs were leaving her completely unprepared for life, and as an aspiring attorney, I didn't feel the premise was realistic. If this family was so straight-laced as they put on, I couldn't see them allowing their daughter to go to law school, let alone pursuing a career of any kind.

I also didn't appreciate the fact the family was judgmental towards others. It seemed to me that if you didn't fully agree with their religious perspectives, it didn't matter whether you claimed to be a Christian--you needed conversion of some sort. This probably bothers me because I do feel like I deal with this on a relatively frequent basis from some of those in my circle.

From a writer's perspective, I actually learned a bit from this book--unfortunately, mostly on a "what-not-to-do" level. First, it reinforced for me the novelists theory (especially for mystery/suspense writers) you must not start the book to early or too late. I honestly felt this book started too early, and a great deal of what was covered could have effectively been handled in little chunks of back story. Of course, this would have dramatically shortened the book (which probably would have been a good thing.)

Having sympathetic characters was another important thing. While I realize not everyone will like or sympathize with every character (and this one definitely met my criteria), it's important you can relate to them if you want to keep readers. Other than the homeschooling factoid, I found it extremely difficult to care about Tami. She seemed weak in most areas because she was leaning too hard on her parents as a 24-year-old young woman. From my perspective, her parents were doing her a disservice. But that's neither here nor there.

Anyway, here's my question for you: Have you hung in with a book where you didn't like the story or characters? If you have, why did you? What, if anything, did you learn from the book? In the end, did you like the book or were you more like me--dissatisfied and very unlikely to read anything more from the author?

Until next time,