Oh, what a year! Personally, it’s one for the books, but this a writing blog!
I sold a story in the last quarter of 2021, my first ever, and it went to print in March 2022. I sold my second story in June, and a third in July, both went to print in December.
I finished my second novel, shelved the first after querying 100 agents and receiving absolutely no interest, and began querying the second one instead. It didn’t get anymore interest than the first, and, while I had intended to query it at least as long as the first, possibly until I had a third to query instead, I stopped at 55.
I just don’t have it in me to query these two projects anymore. I don’t know if they just aren’t up to standard or the time just isn’t right for them, but I don’t fee like I should be subjecting them to the process at this time. They are part of a much larger world that has lived in my head for about 20 years now. There’s a lot of baggage here. A lot of preconceived expectations built up in a younger mind. I have evolved, my skill has evolved. I’m not entirely sure I can execute the old ideas to the full extent of my current ability.
Maybe some day I will return to this world and these characters and rework these old books. I hope so. Maybe I’ll save bits and pieces and grow something entirely new from the loam of these past creations. I look forward to discovering their fate.
In the meantime, I began and entirely new book in September. It started as a short story, written much earlier in the year, that wasn’t quite fantasy enough and wasn’t quite literary enough. In an effort to figure out what to do with it, I asked myself what would make it definitively fantasy. Obviously, the answer was a dragon. But then I had to figure out how to fit that in. Once I had that worked out, the book started writing itself. By mid-October, including the original short story, I had 96k words.
I was blown away by the unprecedented progress. So, come November, since I handwrite everything and no idea how many words I actually had, and the story had finally reached a point where I was stalling out, losing momentum as I floundered forward, I used Nanowrimo to transcribe what I had written in September, day by day. I had won by the 21st. It was a good feeling.
More importantly, my transcription break succeeded in the manner I had hoped it would: I had found my way forward.
Now the holidays are presenting a constant drain on this introvert brain, so even when I have the time, even though I have the words, I struggle to find the energy to string them all together and scribble them out on paper. It’s okay, though, because my oldest has decided they like wrestling and has joined the high school team. Wrestling tournaments are ALL DAY events, at which I find myself sitting in a gym for hours on end with nothing else to do. I get a weeks worth of writing in one day.
I’ve written another short story I’m proud of. I’ve trunked a whole class of short stories. I’m stubbornly continuing to submit others that are collecting double digit rejection records.
I maintain: I am my first audience. I write for myself. I’ll continue to throw my words out like dandelion seeds, and maybe someday I’ll have a garden. Until then, I write.
