Patience over the Long, Long Haul
By Tracy Hahn-Burkett | March 26, 2017 |
Let’s say I’m writing a novel. Heck, let’s say I’m rewriting it. And let’s say this process is taking me an ungodly long time. How long? Let’s not get bogged down in details. This is all theoretical, anyway. I’m hypothesizing for a friend.
Why, fellow unpublished novelist, might this rewrite be taking so long? There are so many reasons: kids, home, work, aging parents, democracy, volunteering in your community, etc. If you want to publish, yes, you need commitment. But you also can’t ignore the rest of your world. Throw in a few life crises, and the process of writing a novel can start to feel like it contains more chapters than the novel itself. Raising a kid? That only takes eighteen years. But a novel is forever.
So what do you do when you feel like every writer you know has finished her seven-book series while you’re still struggling with your debut (or maybe your second or third book)? First, stop beating yourself up. It’s okay. Second, recognize that this abundance of time is an opportunity, especially if you’re unpublished. If you don’t have an agent and publisher tapping their fingers on their desks, expecting you to meet a contractual deadline, then use this time to work on your craft and get that novel right. If all goes well, you may not have this kind of time in the future.
Third, be prepared. If you’re traveling the long road to finishing a book, you may run into a specific set of problems, one or more of which undoubtedly involve you questioning your own sanity. Let’s examine some of these potential anti-speed traps, and see if there’s anything we can do about them.
The gnawing plot problem
You’ve come to a tricky plot point in the middle of your manuscript, and the problem is exacerbated because you can’t give it your undivided attention. Here’s the trap: you’ll solve this problem. Then you’ll solve it again. And again. In fact, you’ll come up with so many solutions to this problem and have so much time to consider each one while you’re tending to your other obligations that you’ll decide each solution seems too contrived to be usable. If it’s not contrived, it’s too obvious, as evidenced by the fact that you thought of it. This is true even if in your literary historical novel set during the American Revolution, it occurs to you that aliens from the Vega star system could thwart the British before they capture the young Patriot by guiding said Patriot to the cache of laser-powered muskets. Duh. Anyone would see that coming.
The solution? Realize it’s possible your perspective has become skewed over time. Yes, you’ve thrown out at least fifty possible plot points. But hopefully you kept a few of the better ones in a “scraps” file somewhere, because chances are at least one of them contained a nugget of something good. Go back and find it. Better yet, stop at maybe twelve or twenty solutions and look through those. Something in there is bound to work.
The symbolism epidemic
In discussing her novel, Commonwealth, Ann Patchett said, “None of it happened, but all of it’s true.” (This immediately became one of my favorite quotes.) It’s common for novelists to figure out what they believe, what they think, even who they are through their writing. But over a period of several years, this can go too far.
If you’re a writer with too much time to think, you may experience streams of epiphanies about your manuscript. You realize, in private moments when you’re focused on other things—taking care of kids, zoning out at a work meeting—that various elements from your book actually refer to pieces of you and your life. The boyfriend is your lonely childhood. The sister’s death is your changed ambition. The zombies’ temporary victory is that fear that gnaws at you constantly that climate change will steal the world from your great-grandchildren, and you’ve never admitted that to yourself before. Darn, now you must confront that not just in your manuscript, but in real life, too.
As the epiphanies mount, so does your fear that your characters will drown in these moments of real-world clarity. But wait a little longer. These epiphanies should eventually—and mercifully—trail off. The protagonist who keeps interrupting your sleep to explain how her mental breakdown is a representation of your psyche after you lost a job, a girlfriend and a dog all in a month will sooner or later finish with you and turn back to the story you’re writing. Then you can return to manipulating her instead of the other way around.
The “my character has moved on” problem
Your poor characters. You tortured them emotionally, mentally, maybe even physically. You lived with them for a year or more, felt their pain, internalized their sorrow. Their tears were your tears, their few successes your happiness. All their emotions, which you channeled, are reflected in the first draft of your book. It’s how you knew you were on to something good.
But years later, you’re still revising, and guess what? Everybody’s moved on. No one stays enraged forever. Devastation eventually turns into acceptance; despair into action. Your characters recover, which is good, because they live in your brain space, and you don’t want to feel those crushing emotions for too long. But the problem is that part of your revision includes writing new material, and you need to feel those characters’ emotional states again in order to write new chapters that will be just as true as the ones you wrote before. How can you feel properly devastated again?
In case you’re wondering, this is why non-writers think we’re twisted. Seek out whatever external stimuli you can to recall the searing emotions necessary for whatever you need to write or rewrite. What did you rely on in earlier drafts? Music? Play those songs again. Reading memoirs? Go back to passages you highlighted. Did you interview people in your characters’ professions, buy a scarf that your character never took off, go to a park where a scene took place and snap photos? Did a particular aroma rise from a cherished recipe? Bring out anything you can, do whatever you need to do to accompany your characters back to the key places in their lives. Then, with closed eyes if necessary, write or revise the appropriate portion of your book.
The “a real writer would be done by now” problem
Ah, self-doubt. Where would we be without it?
If your kid was born when the idea for your manuscript was and now you’re sorting through college acceptances, it’s hard not to blame yourself. And maybe it’s true: maybe you’re not that dedicated to your book, or maybe this book wasn’t the right one for you to write. Maybe you do have the attention span of a tadpole. I don’t know you. (Probably.) But consider that there may be other factors at play. Life can develop in stages, and maybe this stage isn’t your best for setting aside the daily hours of writing you need to dedicate to finishing this manuscript. That’s frustrating, but it’s okay. It doesn’t mean you’re defective or not a writer.
I’m saying this twice because it’s that important: Stop beating yourself up. Write when you can. Look for openings in time where you can create writing space. Keep notebooks everywhere and jot down ideas, patches of dialogue, bits of narrative. Write and publish some smaller stuff both for the experience and to build some confidence. Know that difficult times won’t last forever. If you’re writing anything, you’re writing, and your book will still be there when you’re ready.
Spoiler: This isn’t a hypothetical. The current section of my work-in-progress is entirely new, and it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever written. I’m writing it mostly on scraps of notebook paper that I keep in the car, on the coffee table, in the shower, next to my side of the bed and in a baggie in my purse. I’ve used the white space on a Band-Aid wrapper when nothing else was around. My manuscript is taking me longer to complete than I had hoped, but I’m getting it done.
And no matter how long it takes you, you can get your novel written, too.
[coffee]
Tracy Hahn-Burkett is a writer and public policy advocate who has written everything from speeches for a U.S. senator to texts seeking proof-of-life from her kids in college. She’s published dozens of essays, columns, articles, reviews and a story, and teaches writing for advocacy. She currently lives in the Washington, D.C. area with her husband, cat, and dog, and she is revising her first novel. Her website is TracyHahnBurkett.com. You can find her on Threads as @tracyhahnburkett.
Shoot, look at Donna Tartt! I mean, like 10 years between novels or something like that – and she’s brilliant!
Great tips!
Good point, Kat! May we all write novels as brilliant as hers.
I like the idea of a “Scrap” file. there is so may ideas that I have passed on, deleted them away like so many misspelled words. thanks for the tip.
Ryan, I don’t think I’d revise a paragraph without my Scraps file. I figured out a long time ago that I need some emotional way to keep my darlings in order to kill them, even if I never look at them again. It’s the first thing I open when I sit down to write. Whether I’m cutting a sentence or a whole scene, if there’s anything at all I like in there, I paste the whole thing into a Scraps file and then I don’t have to worry I might regret it later. I rarely retrieve anything from the file, but occasionally I’ll look back to remind me of something I was trying to say and consider whether the concept still matters. Mostly it’s just a comfort thing, allowing me to delete without worrying I’m losing anything forever.
What, you again!?!? I hadn’t been regularly reading the series recently- TRYING to find time to write- but I dip into a title that’s defining my current problem and it’s you, my better-looking namesake. Spot-on today, truly this is a big problem for many of us. I’ve been happily laboring on this one, off and on, for over three years (and it’s just a novella!). I’m holding up a series while I tinker and nudge the manuscript forward, and recently I’ve realized I’m really close to the end.
I wonder if I’m kidding myself, to think that this could be my best writing yet. I can’t get enough beta-readers to tell if I’m out of the echo chamber (worst thing about writing a series, no one can come with). And I’ve started to believe I’m dragging my feet, because the polish is going to be painful. But I so WANT to be done with this one. Because I honestly think it will be good.
Thanks for the encouragement.
Hi Will of the Good of the Last Name! It sounds like you’re seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, which is a great place to be after three years of hard work. Knowing that you’ve done your best with it will be such a good feeling. Let us know when you get there!
Wonderful advice for a Sunday morning! Thanks, Tracy.
Thanks for commenting, Paula.
Hi Tracy. I rarely comment (maybe this is my debut), but your “peace” this morning had my name all over it. I’m not even young and still fooling with a novel – now resting comfortably in a box – and in the middle of a memoir. I think my experience might be true for others – wrong genre. My novel was too much my memoir, so finally have what all those notes and characters chattering during the night were about-release me from your novel!
One other MAJOR appreciation to you today and to this column everyday – there are no typos to make me flinch. You and all of the other contributors take the time to revise/edit before hitting send.
Thank you, Barbara, for commenting. Realizing what you need to write is critical and not always easy. Congrats on getting there!
And revision is the true writing sometimes, isn’t it? Revising, and revising, and revising… Thanks again for your kind words! :)
Good note about not looking too hard for pieces of the novel that symbolize our own lives. I am definitely guilty of that!
My novel is also taking a lot longer than I expected. My sister laughs at me when I say “I’m almost finished!” because I said the same thing a year ago. However, in trying to feel better about all this, I tell myself that the extra time helped the ideas “marinade” in my brain and resulted in a richer, more meaningful book.
Good luck to you on finishing your novel! I’m right there in the trenches with you.
Haha, Rebecca, I’ve stopped talking to people about my book whenever possible because it’s just so much easier that way. I don’t want to answer anyone’s questions about it unless they know how this process works–and sometimes not even then!
I’m sure you’re right. I know I’ve had some ideas for my book I wouldn’t have if I’d not let things “marinate” for so long. That’s a definite silver lining when things take longer than you’d like.
Tracy, you had me at “democracy” and “volunteering.” Like you, I can’t shut myself off from the world and the things I’m passionate about.
Thanks for the tidbits on how to write in snatched moments. I’m putting bandaids in my purse right now!
Rita, yes, the world has taken huge gulps of my time in the past few months. I feel that as an obligation. But I also feel that writers have an increased importance in the world, though that’s probably a topic for another blog post.
Carry those Band-Aids everywhere; you never know when you’re going to need them!
Hi, Tracy:
Your advice to “stop beating yourself up” resonates. The longer I stay at this, the more I realize that I get far more accomplished by being patiently persistent, gentle, and forgiving, than I ever did flogging myself.
Joshua Mohr once said at a conference, “Learn to respect the pages the reader will never see.” That too is wise advice, and echoes with what you’ve said here.
Thanks!
David, I have done so. much. flogging. But it really isn’t constructive, is it? Yet it seems we writers do it so often.
I like that line about the pages the reader never sees. I believe you do need to write those to get to the good pages. As you get better, perhaps you need to write fewer of them, but you still need to go through that process of figuring out what you’re writing about by doing it. Then improving the ideas you’ve discovered can be a satisfying process in itself.
Love this. Thank you.
Written just for me, I feel. Still learning not to beat myself up about it.
I currently revising my revision for the bazillionth time (and yes, that last baby is graduating college next year) and this wonderful post is a perfect booster shot for a process I never seem to fine tune. Every novel remains a mystery–a mystery in that each and every time I type “The End,” I find my self wondering and amazed how I got there.
Abundant wisdom in this post, Tracy! Thank you!
I agree: there are too many writers out there insisting on getting a 4, 7, 10 series of novels up and running within the first couple of years of writing. The problem is, many of them are rubbish. But even apart from that (some authors actually are prolific and can write well at the same time) there’s nothing wrong with being a slow writer. Some books come easily, some don’t. My first and fourth books both took what seemed to me to be far too long, but they’re the better for it. The two in the middle were written within months.
Thank you Tracy! Your advice is gold. I have been lurking around your website and reading all your posts with WU. Some of what you experience while writing hits home with me. You seem to have so much wisdom about the process it’s hard to believe you haven’t written 20 novels. I’m looking forward to more.
Thank you so much, Cate. I’m so glad what I’ve written is meaningful for you. I’m still working on that first novel, but I like the number you wrote here. :) Good luck with your writing process, too!