new book is started (and thoughts on getting started)

I've been doing the research forever (years, really), but yesterday I actually started writing the first draft of my new historical novel.  It took me a while of staring at the blank screen (at least an hour, and this is with having a very detailed outline already) before I actually got some words written, but I promised myself that I'd write at least a page.

I ended up with about 1,400 words (5 pages) which is an excellent start.  The hardest part is not getting distracted by new research questions, but I'll work all of that out.  My plan is to start writing 5 days a week, shooting for about 1,000 words a day (more is good).

I truly LOVE first drafts.  They're my very favorite part of being a writer.


A friend asked me the other day how I manage to get started writing and how I avoid the internal censor.  That's what trips up a lot of people.

Here's the advice I gave her:

If you're stuck, take a look at Anne Lamott's Bird by Bird, or Julia Cameron's The Arist's Way.  They talk a lot about how to cope.

Here is some advice, that I've learned over the years:

• Be willing to write crap.  First drafts have lots of crappy stuff in them.  You don't have to show anyone.  Don't expect to write a finished book with your first draft.  People get confused, because they read great published books.  Those books didn't start out great.  The first drafts were complete crap, and then got revised, and revised again, and then got edited, and edited again.  (Yeah, there are people who write perfect first drafts, but those people are rare and are best avoided.  They can only make you feel bad.)
• Nobody sits down and writes a book.  If you sit down thinking about the book or play you're going to write, it's just impossible.  It's too huge.  There are too many ideas and characters and images and words.  Who can get it all out?  I don't sit down and write a book or a play.  I write a chapter, a scene, a page, a sentence, a few words.  I think a scene is the most manageable chunk--figure out the scene, the interaction you want to write, and get that out.
• Don't read what you're writing.  Seriously.  There's time to go back and read what you've written later.  You know what you wrote, pretty much.  If you go back and reread it, you'll just want to quit, because it's so much worse than you'd hoped (because it's a first draft, remember).  But the better version, the soul of it, lingers in your mind enough for you to write the next scene.  Focus on that one.  There will be time to fix all this stuff later.  For now, enjoy the ride and build some momentum.

(I do plan to reread all this advice come Monday morning when I'm trying to get myself to write Chapter Two of this new book.)


Go write that bad scene.

Advice for young writers (from Patrick Rothfuss and me)

I really like this post from Patrick Rothfuss' blog on advice he has for young writers.  Basically, he says, learn to live cheaply.  Which is great advice for anyone who wants to spend his or her life doing something that doesn't pay a lot money.  (But he says it in a really fun way.)

I'd definitely like to second his advice.  When I was just starting out, right after college, Tracy and I lived in the New York/New Jersey area, and it was incredibly expensive.  It was hard to have enough money to have time to write.  When Tracy got the chance to transfer to Denver, it was a great opportunity for her, and for us.  And even though it meant moving away from New York, just as my playwriting career was getting ramped up, it still made sense.  At the time, Denver was super cheap (we could buy four-bedroom house for $72,000)  (Denver's not cheap anymore, by the way).  In NYC, I needed to work about half time, and even then money was tight.  (And our student loans were nothing compared to what kids take out now.)  The move to Denver meant a lot more time to write.  I worked just a small part-time job, but had a huge amount of time to write.  I not only had the time to write, but also time to work on productions, start writers' groups and theatre companies.  The time and flexibility to create gave me just what I needed to grow as a writer


By the way, my main piece of advice to young writers (probably already articulated in this blog, at some point, but worth repeating right before Valentine's Day) is marry well.  The youngsters always laugh when I say this, thinking that I mean "marry rich."   Which isn't what I mean at all.  Not that "marry rich" isn't a bad idea for a writer.  But not nearly so important as marrying/partnering well.  If you're going to partner/marry someone, and you want to do well as a writer, you need to make sure you're hitched to someone who has a full and complete comprehension of what this whole "writer business" means.  Or who can stomach it, once the learn what it means.  That it's unlikely to pay very well, that it will keep you up at night or keep you out at night, that it will mean that you will often be distracted, that you will complain about the same things (rejection, lack of audience, critics, etc.) over and over again.  That despite all the promise that  you show as a budding genius, that you might not be a genius, but just someone who needs to write and tries to get better at it, and sometimes fails, or fails most of the time.  And that giving up isn't really a suitable option, because being a writer isn't necessarily something you do, but part of who you are.  All of which requires a significant amount of patience and forbearance.  You will need someone able to be strong when you are weak, able to boost your spirits when you are tired, which will happen, because for almost all of us, living life as a writer is often hard and tiresome and grinding (and lovely and amazing and thrilling).  All of which will test you and your relationship.

I've leaned on Tracy for almost 22 years of marriage, and know el that I've been especially lucky that I followed my own advice, long before I could have known it's important.

So again, young writers, good luck to you.  And marry well, if you can.