Why do we do it?
It's certainly not for the money. No-one bar the select few can actually make a living from writing – let's knock that one on the head for starters.
For the sense of achievement? Well, maybe. Maybe just having done a thing is enough. Not for me, though – I want to be read, and it'd be nice to have a little appreciation. Maybe that means I'm shallow. Not much more I can say about that. What's writing without at least a little self-doubt?
There has never been so much (excellent) competition in the field. So many writers fighting over the scraps of agency, of open submission periods. The chances of even getting a sniff of a deal seem astronomical.
And this is before AI comes in to make the whole industry redundant.
I've written before about being a failure. And that's on my mind again right now. I feel I have to accept that the trilogy I've been working on for heaven knows how long will never be traditionally published.
So what do I do now? In any rational world I'd quit. And, to be honest, just… giving in… has never felt so tempting.
But there's something about writing, something about creating, that just won't let go. I can't give in, because what would I do with myself then?
And I can't let a novel go incomplete. I need to finish Breathing Fire – and by finish I mean give it as much polish as I can give without a professional editor (ideally paid for by someone else) going over it. That means I finish my alpha-readthrough then put it out to the betas for further dissection. Then I go through it again.
I am determined to end up with the best possible version of this novel I can possibly get.
I'm just not sure why.
I mean, I could self-publish. It's just that I've been marginally dissuaded from this by two factors: firstly, my experiences with New Gods have taught me that I have not the skill nor the will to promote myself and my work effectively. The work itself I believe in: my business talents less so. Secondly, I have heard whispers that say my work has more value as a potential future sale than as a failed self-published venture. I'm not sure if this is true, but I have been checked in my beliefs. So I haver and hesitate and do nothing.
Besides, it's summer holidays so I have little opportunity for anything beyond fretting.
So I stumble on and I stumble on. I have to finish this readthrough of BF and then it's on to the only thing that gives me any hope at all: the small, miniscule possibility that an entirely new project might help me reach the upper slopes of Mt Publishing.
But I am weary. Base camp may be a long way behind me, but the peak is still shrouded in mists.
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