So today, at 9:23 am, I finished the first draft of the novel I was working on. I hate finishing the first draft.
I love to rewrite but . . .
Ending the first draft always leaves me depressed. I saw Barbara Gowdy read the other night and she said that finishing a book was like running towards the edge of a cliff. She’s right. You never really know if you can do it again. It’s a lot of work and a huge pain in the ass.
I’m 40,000 words –about halfway– through another novel, which I plan to complete within a month. I also have an idea for a graphic novel script about robots and child stars, which I want to start work on ASAP. But you never really know how things are going to go until you get your hands dirty. Writing a book is a lot like tearing up the floor in an old house. Once you see what’s down there, it might have been a better idea to have left well enough alone.
I already miss the characters. I enjoy waking up to them and coming home to them. They become friends of a sort. After a while – for me, about 30,000 words — they start doing what they want. I just watch them have their fun, only intervening to make their lives more miserable and to watch them struggle out of whatever shit I’ve put them in. This amuses me.
It’ll be a month before I come back to “Madcap Slaughter and the Oz Factory”. (The title will change too. It better, at least, that one is horrible.) I need to forget what happened before I rewrite it. After I’m done the rewrites, I know that I’ll feel all this misery again. Well, that’s something to look forward too.
God, I’m depressed right now. I hate finishing the first draft. It means returning – briefly, I hope — to real life.
2 comments
mona lisa
March 15, 2007 at 6:02 am (UTC -5)
ugghh, real life. don’t worry it’ll fade soon.
Ryan Oakley
March 17, 2007 at 2:10 pm (UTC -5)
Yeah, I’m back at work on something else already. Hopefully be done its first draft by the time I have to rewrite.