It's been a whole year!
“There are no laws for the novel. There never have been, nor can there ever be.” Doris Lessing
I started writing on here at the beginning of December last year, and with the help of some lovely guest writers, a post has somehow appeared every single week.
I have loved every minute - it’s been a challenge and it’s been good for my writing. But - and you knew there was a ‘but’ coming, right? - I am not going to be writing here as regularly from now on.
As I said, I do really love this project, so I’m not giving it up. But I do have to prioritise writing the next novel, and I am still struggling with very limited energy, so something has to give.
At the moment, I am still planning to post every day over on Write With The Accomplice. There, I mostly write a few words about how my writing’s going, borrow a writing meme from elsewhere which takes my fancy, or just generally rabbit on about any writing issues I’m grappling with - characters, timelines, structure, plot holes! All the usual stuff where I get stuck, over and over.
But I will still share interesting articles here, which have grabbed my interest. And once in a while I might be inspired to write a more serious, longer piece.
And if anyone would like to write a guest post, or if you have some book news to share with us, please do get in touch.
Today’s link is to a fascinating piece about Celeste Ng’s writing process, from Lithub.
Celeste Ng on Writing with a Plan
I really liked this idea, and plan to adapt it, to incorporate into my own process.
I usually begin each day by rereading what I did the day before. And then I will sometimes write about what I think I’m talking about, almost as if I’m analyzing somebody else’s text, where I [am] like, Okay, I think the reason the character is doing this is really in response to her mother, and I’ll write those sorts of things. …
A lot of times, you can’t see what it is that you’re working on until you have had some distance from it. And part of getting that distance, for me, is writing it out. It’s almost like a process of self-analysis. I know that there are writers out there who outline and then write from the outline, and my process is actually the reverse, which is that I write first and then I have to go back and I outline what it is that I was writing about. Then I can look and say … That must be something that my mind is turning over. …
That’s it for this week! Thank you all for being here, and although I’m slowing down, I hope you’ll choose to stay. And I will keep an eye open for articles and links which may be of general interest to all us writers for next week,
Ann
If you would like some editorial help with your novel draft. please do get in touch and we can have a chat. Check out my Facebook Page, at The Accomplice and message me there for more details, or get in touch through my substack email.