Welcome to the third and final post of the
Dust It OffBloghop. (This week's #writemotivation post will be up tomorrow. Sorry about that.)
So... what have I learned from this WIP? A ton about writing, even more about myself.
Before The Guardians, (its name at the time) I had never wanted to be a writer. I was an artist, and sometimes artists create their own original characters (OCs) to draw. Sometimes we want to create something from scratch instead of always copying something or someone who already exists. Once I had these characters, I couldn't draw them standing like mannequins in a void. I had to think up scenes, wardrobes, how they would carry themselves, what backstory might have affected their personalities, and I even made up an entire world as a backdrop. But I didn’t consider writing any of it down until NaNoWriMo 2010.
I learned I could be a writer. I joined on a whim, and because of peer pressure, really. I’d spent years doing nothing productive, barely even making art anymore. I wondered what else I could accomplish in the time allotted to playing Farmville and hanging around message boards all day.
By Nov 30th, I'd written a 54k novel.
I learned I wanted to be a writer. When I saw that purple Winner’s banner, I felt so accomplished. After all that time I’d wasted, after not having drawn anything for over a year, I’d finally used my creativity for something. I’d written an actual novel. But I did as advised and put it away for a month before looking at it again. 30 days later? I saw it for the dreck it was. It did have potential, though. And so did I. Because I’m incredibly stubborn, I decided that even though everyone else trunks their first novel, I wouldn’t. I was going to polish that pile of crap and make it shine like the hood of a Porsche. Heck, I wrote it in a month, so editing would take, what, two? Three tops?
I learned how to write. Since then, I've read everything I could about prose, plot structure, character development, worldbuilding, POV, tense, dialogue, even publishing. In between all that reading, I put my new found knowledge into practice, rewriting the story over and over and over again.
I learned that practice doesn't always make perfect, but it does mean improvement. There are over twenty uncompleted first drafts of this novel written from different POVs, in different tenses, starting at different points, using different plots. You know that whole 1,000,000 words thing I was talking about last week? Well, I used over 300,000 on this project alone.
I continued to read moving up to things like voice and closing the narrative distance. (Thanks, polymath.) About pacing, twists, foreshadowing, hooks, etc. About editing. Then I tried again and again and again... but I never finished a single one of those drafts.
I learned when I was in over my head. And how not to give up on it or myself. It still needs work. Plot, voice, prose. So much so that I had to shelve it for my own sanity. I’m not talented enough to do it justice. Not yet, at least. But even if it never sees the light of day, I can't be ashamed, because it was the starting point of what's been already an amazing journey so far. It's the project that changed my entire life and made me the writer I am today.
What did you learn from your first novel or your favorite shelved WIP?
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