JUL
2014 11

B lately has been “working on her book”,

she sits on a little chair and uses the piano bench as her desk and writes squiggly lines across pages and pages of paper. She stresses out about it, says, “I’m not going to finish it before Grandma leaves!” or “I need to finish it before we go camping!” She won’t say what it’s about. Yesterday she was sitting at the kitchen table bemoaning the fact that her book wasn’t going to be done before Grandma leaves and I said, “So go work on it.” And she said, “I can’t, I need a snack first.” It is incredibly mind-blowing to…

Read more

JUL
2014 02

Writing

Argghhh, sucked in by the NYTimes.

Okay. What was the question? What am I trying to do. I would like a list of the central big plot questions and I would like to brainstorm solutions so that I can begin to pick off the remaining to-dos one by one so that I can feel good about something called “completion” and begin to send out queries with reckless abandon and feel like if someone actually wants to see the manuscript I won’t have to scramble. Also, I could give it to people to read. That’s a noble cause, right? Right. Let’s open up the docs and see…

Read more

JUN
2014 26

Writing

What do I need to do this?

I feel a repulsion because the end is where the biggest, most glaring weaknesses live. It is just a list. I just want to list out what happens so that it is easier to look at and think about. This list is going to be a tool for thinking, I don’t know how that thinking is going to happen. Do I need to know that? Not at this sitting. I just need to carry on with the list. There will be pre-reqs for the thinking, and they will include a clean space and silence and solitude. I will figure out…

Whether your novel is publishable is, for you, an imponderable, so my advice is to avoid the occasion of sin and try to put this question out of your mind. You have made your commitment; now make the most of it. You will also try to decide whether it is good. Let me answer that for you--it is, but it can be better, and your job in rewriting is to make it better. "Better" is not a global trait, but a group of specific qualities you can work toward one by one, knowing that they work ecologically--as you make one better, it might get out of balance with the others, but it also might make the others better. Every novel is a system. Sometimes the system looks out of balance, sometimes the system looks in balance but rather shallow, sometimes a small change balances the whole system and everything gets better and deeper.

MAY
2014 25

Quotes

— Jane Smiley

FEB
2014 23

Writing

Today I have an hour

and I would like to do today what I said I was going to do yesterday. To that end, I will be CLOSING MY INTERNET BROWSER for the next hour, and not opening it. Hear that, Sarah? CLOSED. The Internet is closed to you until noon. Offline. Even for quick checks.

FEB
2014 21

Writing

Writing my doubts here:

This particular thinking problem is TOO BIG and encompasses like, the whole book, and I can’t wrap my head around the whole book all at once, dammit. There are too many lost opportunities going on here. I need an entire WEEK all, all alone, with someone to bring me my meals, and a really long, conference-room length conference table (except: I don’t want to retreat to some abysmal convention center or something), okay, I want an ENTIRE WEEK up at the Buddhist retreat center and I want a hallway with a hallway-length whiteboard and windows looking out onto the pines.…

FEB
2014 21

Writing

I think I might be stuck,

guess there’s no reason to announce that before it’s a thing, aye? But really, it is helpful to notice that reluctance to go in is not a character flaw but the part of my brain that lives in book world is acutely aware that we don’t know what to do next and so is less than motivated to get me there. I have not touched the books for months and months and then gone in and realized: oh! what is going on is I DON’T KNOW WHAT TO DO NEXT, that is all. Can keep me away for a long…

FEB
2014 14

Writing

Okay, so no words.

I did some planning, wrote out a map for the rest of Ch. 8, and THAT was a bitch. Constant distractions, which I succumbed to. Check the bank balance. Google the life cycle of fungus gnats, so I can develop a plan of attack for a couple of houseplants that have them. Make more tea. Look to see when I’m going to get charged for Daily Burn? Look at the upcoming bills. Contemplate whether or not I need to get something for Valentine’s Day. ARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHhhhhh But the book… the map for the rest of chapter 8, I am probably in…

FEB
2014 14

Writing

6:54. I just heard the kids’ door.

Perhaps they can be bribed with cupcakes and movies to give me time to write??? It is Friday, we don’t have anywhere to go for once. I can probably give the book an hour if my bribes work, which they’ve seemed to for the moment. Let’s settle for a moment. Drifting down through layers of V-day bullshit, money thoughts, thoughts about “how little time I have” (that’s my favorite recording at the moment, would love to just shut that one off), how I just need to be able to “relax” but maybe that’s more of a state of mind? Relaxed…

FEB
2014 13

Writing

What’s up, book. 6:33 am.

Breathing. Okay. I think I left off writing at a spot where it’s going to be hard to have a 1000-word day, and that’s okay. I need to go back and see how I left that other thing at that other spot and try to remember how exactly this next part needs to go. Reminder, brain, THIS IS PART OF WRITING. No, it is not as trackable as words written. THAT’S OKAY. We can’t write if we honestly don’t know what to write next. (I know, I know, sometimes I just say I don’t know what to do next, when…