Trust me I understand this emotional roller coaster you're riding, I do. Didn't you see me waving madly at you as you zipped by in one direction? I was the one with the head hanging upside down, caught in a loop. :)
Anyway. It's hard not to read between the lines, isn't it? I look for reasons as to this and that constantly. I hit the Send/Receive on my inbox more times than I care to know about. Here's what helps me around the minute I'm optimistic and the very next minute when I'm drowning in a pool of pessimism.
Like you mentioned in the other post - the latest WIP. New work you can bury yourself in and you said in that other post it seemed as if it was gaining traction. P.E.R.F.E.C.T. It's taken me a while to get going on mine. I now have this HUGE idea about it in my head, and I'm sort of afraid I can't meet my own expectations, but I'm going to try and it will consume just about all my brain power to carry it off. I'm worried I'll get the rough draft done and realize I've got some enormous plot hole, but that's all just fear talking - and speculation.
This is keeping me distracted from other stuff that could drive me crazy. New work = new hope. I'm glad you're working on a new project. In the meantime, pop THE AX off to an agent here and there and keep that pot going while you write the other.
Of course, you have much more going on than merely dithering, woodland-creature-style, over a book!
I'm still feeling out the idea of giving up on Ax for now, but there really do seem to be no more resources left to research, really. If I ran across a cache of agents who rep histfic, I might not be thinking this way. But the market *itself* seems not to be workable for a debut author peddling my kind of goods.
The WIP is more modern histfic (har), and I think may have a better chance as a first outing.
Ax is ten YEARS of my life now. I want to see it succeed. I just wonder - is the right way for that to happen, to let something else lead the way?
And I truly do not know. Letting go now - seriously, the synopsis and the query are great, I really think - and after all these years of work and learning and planning and trying ...
"Of course you have much more going on than merely dithering, woodland creature-style over a book."
Maybe not. I do have an agent, yes, but unless he is able to sell a book, I don't know if I feel all that much better, I mean, what if it NEVER happens from that point either. I'm starting a fourth book, and all I can think is, OMG. My brain is still in the other one. My first one took ten years as well. And it didn't sell. Then, I didn't go on sub with the second. I probably will eventually, but the thing is, I've been told writers can't just go on sub, boom, boom boom. When my first was out, a year later, agent said it was too soon for the second book to go. So I said, just wait, let me write this third one. I did, and now I'm starting a fourth.
Anyway, I'll just ugh along with you, if you don't mind.
3 comments:
Trust me I understand this emotional roller coaster you're riding, I do. Didn't you see me waving madly at you as you zipped by in one direction? I was the one with the head hanging upside down, caught in a loop. :)
Anyway. It's hard not to read between the lines, isn't it? I look for reasons as to this and that constantly. I hit the Send/Receive on my inbox more times than I care to know about. Here's what helps me around the minute I'm optimistic and the very next minute when I'm drowning in a pool of pessimism.
Like you mentioned in the other post - the latest WIP. New work you can bury yourself in and you said in that other post it seemed as if it was gaining traction. P.E.R.F.E.C.T. It's taken me a while to get going on mine. I now have this HUGE idea about it in my head, and I'm sort of afraid I can't meet my own expectations, but I'm going to try and it will consume just about all my brain power to carry it off. I'm worried I'll get the rough draft done and realize I've got some enormous plot hole, but that's all just fear talking - and speculation.
This is keeping me distracted from other stuff that could drive me crazy. New work = new hope. I'm glad you're working on a new project. In the meantime, pop THE AX off to an agent here and there and keep that pot going while you write the other.
Of course, you have much more going on than merely dithering, woodland-creature-style, over a book!
I'm still feeling out the idea of giving up on Ax for now, but there really do seem to be no more resources left to research, really. If I ran across a cache of agents who rep histfic, I might not be thinking this way. But the market *itself* seems not to be workable for a debut author peddling my kind of goods.
The WIP is more modern histfic (har), and I think may have a better chance as a first outing.
Ax is ten YEARS of my life now. I want to see it succeed. I just wonder - is the right way for that to happen, to let something else lead the way?
And I truly do not know. Letting go now - seriously, the synopsis and the query are great, I really think - and after all these years of work and learning and planning and trying ...
Yeah. Gugh.
"Of course you have much more going on than merely dithering, woodland creature-style over a book."
Maybe not. I do have an agent, yes, but unless he is able to sell a book, I don't know if I feel all that much better, I mean, what if it NEVER happens from that point either. I'm starting a fourth book, and all I can think is, OMG. My brain is still in the other one. My first one took ten years as well. And it didn't sell. Then, I didn't go on sub with the second. I probably will eventually, but the thing is, I've been told writers can't just go on sub, boom, boom boom. When my first was out, a year later, agent said it was too soon for the second book to go. So I said, just wait, let me write this third one. I did, and now I'm starting a fourth.
Anyway, I'll just ugh along with you, if you don't mind.
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