In November 2016 I participated in NaNoWriMo for the second time. My project choice was a first for me—I had decided to try my hand at speculative fiction. When November rolled around I had a great concept and a few characters, but not much else. The momentum for the first few days was great. In fact, the first week and a half I was tapping out more than the sixteen hundred and a bit words needed on a daily basis to hit the 50,000 word target.
But then I hit a wall. Speculative fiction requires world-building, and world-building was not something I was enjoying. I hated it so much that I abandoned the project soon after, choosing instead to just write anything I wanted, daily, for the rest of the month.
I then put the project in a folder, tucked away, and ignored it. I figured it was done. A false start that wasn’t going to go anywhere. Besides not having a world, a plot also hadn’t revealed itself to me. The whole thing felt like a big fail, albeit one that taught me to never, ever try speculative fiction again.
Last week I opened the project up just to take a peek. I wondered if there was anything about it I could salvage, or maybe the characters could be used elsewhere.
As I read through some of what I’d written I realised it doesn’t actually suck.
In fact, there are some aspects of it that are really strong, and even, dare I say, clever. This is a big deal, as I’m my own worst critic, utterly convinced that I am a Terrible Writer who shouldn’t even bother. Re-reading a lot of my stuff just seems to be confirmation that this is a valid, legitimate truth about me. I should give up writing. Or I should only ever do it for fun, in secret, and never tell anyone lest they try to read something I’ve written and discover how appallingly bad I am.
For me to read a project I abandoned and not only think it’s actually decent, but get excited at the prospect of writing more, is a big deal. Not only is it a big deal, it’s also something I’m using to help me refine my focus.
I’ve written a lot, and I’m really attached to basically all of my manuscripts. This makes it hard for me to prioritise just one to work on. I’m still working on the memoir I started during NaNoWriMo this year, but I want to have a fiction project too.
I shared this over-all problem I have with committing to a single piece of writing with a fellow writer friend. She told me to just pick one thing and do it. She actually threatened me a little, and pointed out that if I don’t jump in wholeheartedly to a project, I’d be having the same conversation with her next year.
So I decided to commit to this piece—to use it as my joyful writing piece that I’m just gonna plow through and write this year. I sat down and began by skim reading everything I’d written, to remind myself of the characters and setting and all the background details.
About half an hour in, A PLOT REVEALED ITSELF. Not just that, but a plot that hinged entirely on the concept I was using for the story. Like, a really good, clever plot.
So this is it. I’ve picked my project for the year. It’s call ‘Continuation’ (working title). I'm thrilled.