A writer’s world…

I’ve read over and over recently how lonely a writer’s life is and as I get more and more into the “Story to be Named Later” I realize just how lonely it might get. I read blogs from established authors like Lili St.Crow and I get a glimpse into the busy life of a successful writer and I wonder just how well organized their life is. I sit here writing this and keep glancing at the clock, knowing I’m running out of time. Work is around the corner. Tomorrow is a day to take the little monsters to the parental unit’s house and for the first time since my new commitment to writing I’m trying to figure out how to deal with kids all day AND write. This past weekend is another example. I came home from eight hours on the job and just had no energy to write.

A book will not write itself.

So I find myself hammering out words here and there for twenty minutes, thirty minutes, anything to add to the word count. I day dream while I’m driving to and from work and lay out plots while I’m eating as if possessed by these works that are still waiting to be born. Then the inevitable happens. I get sidetracked. I see something, hear something or smell something that launches my mind into a frenzy of creative activity and a new story idea grows. A new character that seems better, faster, stronger than the one I’m currently writing about. A new genre calls my name and it’s a struggle to maintain the flow on the story I’m currently working on. Then I go back and I sit and I wonder. How do ‘real’ authors deal with these tsunami like ideas when they’re working on their ‘real’ book? Does Jim Butcher put off his latest Dresden novel because he has a great idea for a romance novel? Does Saintcrow put off her latest Strange Angels novel because she has a great idea for a western? Yet authors do jump genre and authors can write a plethora of books (Butcher comes to mind). Robert B. Parker seems to have books coming out at a pace that is startling. He has Spencer novels, a YA Spencer novel, a western, and a Jesse Stone novel all coming out around the same time. Does the man ever sleep!

And then we are back to the original driving force behind the post. How lonely it is to have all of these great ideas and few people to share them with. These ideas and worlds swimming through your head and no one to share them with or at least no one who will really see it the way you do. Hours of pounding away at a keyboard the story playing out like a movie in ones mind and no one to share the maniacal genius of it all. It’s a bit scary and a bit enticing. Still, it’s going to be a long journey until completion. I’m figuring at least 150 rejection slips before I even get close to an acceptance!