All Those Manuscripts in a box

You have them if you write. Manuscripts in a musty box in a basement. Apologies to all those writers who hit it every time with their books and their box is empty or nonexistent. But for everybody else you know what I am talking about. They are the books that just didn't work for whatever reason. A lot of times it takes years to figure that out. Sometimes you see very early on the book is not there and give it up for another project, but usually it is during the third or fourth or fifth or twentieth rewrite the pottery reveals it's cracks and you sigh a collective, oh shit.

The first novel a lot of times makes it. Maybe it's just fresh, but that second book is in danger right away. There is a inclination to try and duplicate what worked before or go way out on a limb and try something extremely different. Both attempts usually fail. For myself I tried a stock thriller that after diagramming and interviewing people and countless drafts just sort of gave itself up as a really bad idea that led to a really bad book. Then the title changed five times and it was just dead.

I followed that with a novel about early yuppies who give it all up to find meaning. Hmmm...Dated before it was even done. Really really bad. That one imploded early and only cost me a year. Then there was the logging book that dragged on for years and then a series of starts that never saw the light of day. What can you say? Writing is like a gun and there are are a lot of misfires. But, occasionally, it comes together and makes every bad novel just a stepping stone along the way. That' what you tell yourself anyway.

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/
Rocket Man will blast off April 26th

On Starting a New Novel

You begin with a tepid step. Those first words are hard fought and that first paragraph is something to hang onto because you are just beginning and the mountain does look tall. But each word, each sentence, each paragraph is a grappling hook to pull yourself higher and you build it just  like that-- one page at a time. I just started a new novel and it is amazing that no matter how many times you do it it is always like starting over. Will this one work? Will this idea carry me through? The same questions every time.

 It is the moment of sitting down. You set your coffee to the right, kick off your slippers, your shoes, curl your toes, take a breath and jump off the cliff. You have disconnected for a while and the world is behind you and all that lies ahead is open space. That is what is exhilarating and scary. You can go anywhere you want because there is nothing there. Just the void and it is up to you to create a world out of that void so your reader can follow. So you start building your ladder.

And each day it does become a bit easier because what you did the day before guides you. A tone is quickly set, a character fleshed out, a momentum established, point of view set. You are now getting confident as you sit in the pilots chair and by the third day you have something that is beginning to look like the start of a good novel. You have a long long way to go but you are after one thing and that is to get that first draft finished. So you don't look back, you plunge on, climb on, take off, you push, bully, grapple, claw your way to the end. And then you start back again.

http://www.billhazelgrove.com/
Rocket Man should blast off in February