When I decided to do NanoWrimo this year, I knew I wasn’t ready to write the book I wanted to write. Almost, but not quite. My main characters are there, and they’ve mostly revealed their personalities to me over the course of the last year when I started and trashed this story five hundred thousand times. I have no idea who my side characters are or what my ‘subplots’ will be but I’ve got a good idea on what I want this story to be. For some reason though, I just can’t seem to get it to that place. And that’s OK, even though being OK is not easy for me to accept. I wanna write it! I want to get this story on the page and start fixing what needs fixed even though it’s not releasing until late late 2019 or even early 2020. I’m not ready to write this story yet. Not in it’s entirety at least. I’ve written two ‘tenative’ drafts one making it to 36k words and another making it to just over 20k (so technically, I’ve won another year of NanoWrimo, just not how I expected to) and while I can see the path I’m headed towards, I haven’t quite cut away enough brush to make it down that path. But with each attempt I make, I see it a little more clearly. Every sentence I write I get to know these characters a little bit more. I know how they fall in love and why and I’ve even come up with some scenes that I know will make the final book because I’ve fallen in love with them. I want these characters to fight getting together though and while they are hella good fighting me against what I want, they are all too quick to want to fall for each other when they’re on the page together.

The hardest part for me has been creating the lead male character that readers fell in love with in my first book. A character that was meant to just be a filler in his first appearance. He had hardly any page time, hardly any words, and was really a shell of a character yet somehow, it’s all anyone ever talks about. I had to get to know him myself, and I had to figure out what his story is. I’ve got it, and now my worry at times is that he won’t be who readers fell in love with. I’m overthinking it, I know I am. But then right as I start to spiral down the path of, I can’t write this one, I remember how vague that character was and the very few characteristics he had that they fell for (confidence, manners, tattoos) and I know I’ve got him right.

The lesson I’ve learned is that books don’t get easier to write. Sometimes characters allow things to happen as we outlined and sometimes they don’t. Mine don’t. But I’m getting there. So, my point of all this jibber jabber is that even if you don’t ‘win’ NanoWrimo, or you don’t end up with a story you thought you would, don’t give up. Every time you write you will get closer to telling the story you’re trying to tell. Each sentence will reveal something else you didn’t know about your characters. Sometimes you just need a break even when you thought it would be free sailing after finally creating an entire synopsis and thinking you had it in the bag, in order to create a world for readers to fall in love with. Take your time. There is no rush (unless you’re on a deadline) and I promise your book will be better in the long run.

Keep writing!

*and… check back here Friday for the cover and title release of my second book, going on pre-order on Friday!

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