When Gillian asked me if I wanted to post again for her wonderful blogging event, I had to go back and reread what I’d written the previous year. It left me very objective of what to post for this year, because much of the past blog post was six months into intermittent lockdowns, the desire for “it” to be over. I don’t even have to explain what “it” is anymore.
And in this new world of normal, and in keeping with this year’s theme, I’ve kept my joys small.
The local juice place.
Reading all my old favorite books.
Getting through TV series from the 90s my parents never let me watch.
But recently I’ve had to learn to take a different path with my writing journey, and that’s writing with no intention of doing anything with the work after it’s done.
I’d lost myself in personal demands to have a project finished and ready to submit. To ensure this story went to my publisher, but another one I’d try to get into pitch wars and query. For certain books to end up in certain places.
It left me conflicted and confused about where to spend most of my efforts.
And while I’m still working on all those scripts, I decided I needed to do some writing too. I longed to get back into a couple of projects but found myself reluctant to work on them. Those had already put me off with the expectations I’d placed on myself for where those books should end up.
I’ve been writing long enough to know what books I’d probably keep to myself to self-publish. What books I think my publisher would be interested in. Other work that I’d see if it was high concept enough to pitch to an agent.
Because this year I spent some time on working on my craft, taking courses to become a dev editor. Became an intern with my publisher. I learned more about the querying process doing this than I ever had from reading all those “how I got an agent” posts.
About genres, word counts, high concept, strong plots, relatable characters. All the things that made a book good or bad. During all this learning it had a huge effect on the way I wrote stories. The tone and structure, flow and effect, all better than I’d written before. My stories then had to have these tools I was learning, and I worked very hard to apply this newfound knowledge to my work.
It was interesting to compare current drafts to the polished book I have coming out on October 1st, Behind the Veil.
Because I’d written that book in twenty-five days with absolutely no purpose behind its creation.
I had an idea, wrote the first chapter, gave it to a friend who told me it wasn’t a short story, and by the time I finished it really wasn’t. But I had no plans for that book so the expectation of what it could be was entirely removed from me until after it was done. I decided, at the suggestion of someone else, to pitch it during a pitch event. Literary Wanderlust was one of the presses that liked the tweet, and later sent an offer of publication.
In preparation for Behind the Veil’s launch I’d realized something critical about the creation that went into this book. I’d written it in a break from the massive fantasy series that I had to put on the backburner due to self-publishing costs. I needed something else to funnel my creative energies into, had been watching an awful lot of Penny Dreadful, and I just wanted to write about the ghost stories I’d obsessed over as a teenager.
But this was something far darker, a scary story that was subtle, exciting and infinitely different.
When I remembered that feeling, that sensation of what it was to write the story just because it wanted to be written, I decided I needed to do it again.
Cue Beasts Within, a semi drafted retelling of Beauty and the Beast, and I can’t stop thinking about this story. I keep going back and adding more bits to it. To twist the characters through perilous times and utter angst.
And I have no idea what will happen when it’s done. Whether I’ll see an opportunity for it later or give it to a friend to read. I think it might just sit in the drafts pile and I’ll look at it in a year or so. But I’m not setting myself up for publishing or querying it. It has no other purpose than to bring me joy.
To indulge in bitchy witches.
To let me giggle over spiky verbal sparring.
To be here for me right now, in this moment, in all its angsty glory.
Writing is meant to be fun, it’s meant to be for you, first and foremost, but when you spend a lot of time doing it, the goalposts around who you’re writing for shift and change. Different projects end up in different places than you expect, but that shouldn’t mean we forget that we’re the ones who spend the most time doing it. We’re the ones who will create and create and have much less of what we envisage ever make it into a reader’s hands.
That’s why the joy of just writing what sends your heart fluttering is what matters. That not everything you do should be for a reason, because the story may never go as far as you expect. That there is no agent, zero editor interest, and no publication contract waiting for every project.
Because those things aren’t in your control. Anyone who does this will tell you that no matter what path to publication you pick, each comes with a lot of challenges, and it won’t always turn out how you envisage.
But those things are all what happens after you finish it. Nothing should take away the joy of just being in the story, writing it with heart and soul because time is precious. Writing is an escape, you are the traveler, so if you are going to do this, then remember to live in the moment.
Write for a joy only you can give to yourself.
E. J. Dawson on Twitter @ejdawsonauthor.