Marie Alice Writes & Reads

Diary of a new writing project. Day 33: a small thing

After all, I received many rejection letters. I’m almost used to it.
Plus, for a whole year, part of my job at a publisher’s house was to send those exact same rejections letters; trust me, I know the drill!

Word count goal for this week: 32 500 words
Word count goal so far: 18 517 words

Writing.
I write because I love it, because I can’t help it. When I write books, I feel alive.
I’m doing what I am supposed to be doing: coming up with stories to share with people, to make them laugh and dream, to help ease their sorrow, to give hope when all hope has been taken away.

So it doesn’t feel great, getting a rejection letter.
Especially a standard rejection letter, the one they send when just one person in the publishing house read, oh, between one and ten pages of the book before deciding going « No », or « Yes » (reminder, I live in a small francophone bubble in Canada, with a very small market and no literary agent).
But it is such a small thing. After all, I received many rejection letters. I’m almost used to it.
Plus, for a whole year, part of my job at a publisher’s house was to send those exact same rejections letters; trust me, I know the drill!

But every now and then, the received rejection letter will hit me a little harder.
Because I have good reasons to believe it might work with one or two publishers.
In this case, I sent a good contemporary YA novel to publishers who were looking very specifically for contemporary YA novels.
I did my research, I read some of the novels the publishers have published before, to make sure my novel would stand out while respecting the publishers editorial line.
I really thought it would work. *deep sight*

When it was time to get some creative writing work done, I did some screen staring/shopping for kiddo clothes/pinning things about rejection on Pinterest for a while.
A sentence heard on NovelTea Show was doing loops in my head the whole time: you fail only if you stop writing.

So, I went and did some writing. Plus a mega-ton of editing.

I was merciless with my writing. Erase stuff, straighten some other stuff. Doesn’t matter if I end up erasing it during revision. I felt better just by working harder on the storytelling, on the phrasing, on the characters.

Game plan for next week is : keep the same word count goal. Writing rush week was a total disaster.
I don’t need to feel miserable because the word count isn’t going up fast enough.
I need to feel good because the writing is decent, at the very least.

Thank you for reading. I hope my rambling was in some weird way helpful.
Find me on twitter or take a look at my Pinterest Writing Boards for writing tips and writing hacks.
Feel free to buy me a little ko-fi if you like this blog.

Until next time!

Diary of a new writing project. Day 32: write anyway

that is not an excuse to not work on YA WIP. Which I did. For a very short amount of time.

This week word count goal: 32 500 words
Word count so far: 18 674 words

I wrote, in a previous post, about how your writer’s life has to adapt to your life as a parent.
Well, today was such a day.

Kiddo took forever to fall asleep; today’s day job work was… something else; I am thoroughly exhausted.

But, that is not an excuse to not work on YA WIP. Which I did. For a very short amount of time.
I am sure I will end up deleting every single word I wrote tonight because it is sooo not working. The whole chapter I thought I had all figured out is not working.
I know why.
It’s because of the rule of three.

In YA WIP, action happens in a haunted place, in a college and in third place (I’m not sure yet, since a character who was supposed to simply show up once brought something way more interesting, in a creating conflicts kinda way).
In the present chapter I am working on, I created a fourth place. And it simply doesn’t work.

The fourth place is where we meet the half-way there antagonist, and I am info-dumping like crazy. Too many details, too many dialogues, too many backstories conflicts that are getting in the way of the actual action.
In short, I am making things too complicated for the reader.

That chapter needs a complete re-write. The one before too.

But it will have to wait until tomorrow. Now, it is brainstorming time. I have to get my characters out of there while introducing the half-way antagonist and the new character. A cute one too.

Anyhou, thanks for reading. Until next time!

Diary of a new writing project. Day 31: When even cheating doesn’t work

Work count goal for the week: 32 500 words
Word count so far: 18 406 words

I cheated today.
I took two hours out of my working day (I so happy to be my own boss!) to work on the YA WIP.
The results were far from great. I had a hard time focusing on the writing, but a pretty good time shopping online for my kiddo – kiddos clothes are the best.

At least, instead of letting myself feel like a loser because of a disapointing word count, I simply reminded myself that I am a creature of habits.
My writing time is at night, and therefore, getting the creative writing juices running during day is harder.
Because during the day, I blog with keywords, topics, sentences length in mind.

A very, very good thing came out of it though: a good brainstorm for the end of the present chapter. Plus, I got the next chapter all figured out.
It helped me tonight, not to write faster I’m afraid, but certainly to write with more confidence.
I had fun writing for the first time since the beginning of this writing rush week I imposed on myself.
Something I am now very inclined to think I won’t do again!

A little pressure is good. A lot of pressure is too much.

Again, thank you for reading.
Find me on twitter or take a look at my Pinterest Writing Boards, or keep in touch and subscribe to this blog.
Feel free to buy me a little ko-fi, it is an amzing way to support this blog.

Until next time!