Projects, Projects Everywhere, and Not a Page to Submit

[stephaniecain]

My best friend in high school always told me I had too many dreams. I wanted to fly helos for the Air Force. I wanted to be an archaeologist. I wanted to be an FBI agent. I wanted to write novels. I wanted to act. I wanted to sing. I wanted to be a cowgirl. My mother, of course, told me that it was good to have that many dreams. Problem was, I ended up majoring in history & creative writing, learning a virtually unemployable skill set. Maybe my best friend was closer to being correct than my mom was. Or maybe it wasn’t that I had too many dreams, but that I couldn’t pick one of those dreams to focus on first.

Something I’ve seen as I read blogs about the publishing world is that a writer should focus on one particular area of writing to make her name. (Never mind that Isaac Asimov published fiction and nonfiction in every single category of the Dewey Decimal system, apparently this isn’t as doable in the 21st Century as it was in the 1950s.) Since I have written epic fantasy, urban fantasy, romance, and crime fiction…this is a problem.

My current dilemma is that my urban fantasy is closest to being ready for publication, plus having three sequels/companion novels written/drafted so I need to revise that one. But I am way more in the mood to work on the epic fantasy, which needs to be completely overhauled and re-WRITTEN from the ground up. A huge project, but especially since I started using Patricia C. Wrede’s world-building questions to inspect and tweak my fantasy world, it’s one I look forward to.

I’ve tried using a bribe to move forward. I’ve told myself to revise the first 50 pages of the urban fantasy, just so I have a good submission packet to query with. Then I can turn my attention to the epic fantasy and make a few submission rounds with the urban fantasy to see if I get any interest. If I get any interest and they want a full manuscript, then I make a really fast revision of the other 100 pages.

We’ll see if this works…

Comments

[jomk.livejournal.com]

Here's the horrible truth about being published. You spend a whole hell of a lot of time writing stuff you don't want to be writing. I wish it were different, trust me, but that's the bottom line. I'm doing revisions now on something I'd pay good money to never have to look at again. And the bald fact is, I'm having to write more and more books that aren't from the heart because I need to keep getting paid.

The unvarnished truth is that writing is all about discipline. More about discipline than any other single thing. Writing when you don't want to, when you're sick, when the spark has left the story. Of all the things I wished I had known before I sold, this is the most important. I still would have written, but I'd have gotten into the mindset of a writer a lot earlier.

Here's another unpleasant but true fact. The gig does not get easier. Trust me. Your dilemma now will be your dilemma after you've published, only then, you'll have a deadline screaming in your ear.

My advice? Work on the stuff you can send out soonest. Jot down notes about your other stories when they hit, but just notes. Not pages of them. Then get back to the book that is in front of you.

It's hard to complete the books that you think are almost ready, because there's risk involved in sending them out. But with each fully completed book, you'll have added another layer to your foundation of knowledge and more importantly your foundation of discipline.

It sounds like a great idea to just get your partial ready, but I don't advise this. Finish the book. Polish it. Make sure you know who your sending it to, and that you've met the word count requirements. Agents and editors want the best you can give them, and to rush through the ending isn't going to give you your best chance.

I really believe you have the talent to publish. Seriously. You're good. Now you have to be tough.

[slightlyjillian.livejournal.com]

Oh Asimov. I love his science fiction and how he could write almost anything not matter how implausible and still get away with a good yarn.

You have my sympathy. I know that I'd like to be writing in the original fantasy universe I've been tooling around in for years, but I just don't have what it takes (skills, understanding, the story) to write that...

On the other hand, I have made progress on the YA novel and it's better for the practice I've put in. So I feel pretty good working on that story instead even if the other is still dear to me. My thought is that the epic stuff will benefit from what I learn toiling through the YA novel.

Haha, maybe it'll make the epic less, well, epic and more manageable? Who knows.

*wry grin* I know that I don't quite have the discipline that jomk mentions. That's why I need the day job... soon.