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Wednesday, December 4, 2019

The Insecure Writer and Finally Completing That First Draft


Today is December's contribution to Alex Cavanaugh's Insecure Writers Support Group.

What makes me an Insecure Writer this month?

Knowing that I’m about to enter a new stage of my writing career.   


I had many writerly goals for 2019.  Most of them won’t be met—no surprise there—but I feel fairly confident that I will finish the first draft of my debut urban fantasy by the end of December. There is still plenty of editing to do before it’s ready for publication, but I’m on the home stretch. 


https://visualhunt.com/f3/photo/4920776953/c76cfc2f81/
Photo courtesy of VisualHunt

As happy as this makes me, it also means I’ll have to start worrying about the rest of this writing business. Cover designers, formatting concerns, figuring out the Amazon system, marketing, mailing lists, reader magnets, social media. I’ve spent a considerable amount of time studying these topics over the past several years, which means I now know enough to know what I don’t know. It all sounds very exciting, if not outright daunting, but I’m ready to dive into the deep end. 

And, of course, while all this is going on, I need to be writing the next book in the series, since the experts say that long periods of time between releases tends to kill interest in a series. 

This month's IWSG question is:

How would you describe your future writer self, your life and what it looks and feels like if you were living the dream?

If I were really living the dream, I’d be living in a castle somewhere in Britain, living off the proceeds from my writing, and sharing tea with J.K. Rowling. In reality, I’d hope that 

1). the writing would come more easily after having a few books under my belt. 

2). I’d have moved on to my next series (or two). 

3). That most of the marketing stuff would be running on automatic. 

In other words, I’d want my writing to seem more like a real job and less like a pipedream. 

Until next year!



ChemistKen

19 comments:

  1. I'm right there with you! I'm so close to finishing the manuscript. I feel like I've learned so much about writing, and yet now there's all this other stuff I have to learn. It's exciting and daunting at the same time.

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  2. Congrats on the draft, Ken. Your dreams are realistic and attainable. :-)

    Anna from elements of emaginette

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  3. Congrats on being so close to the finish line. That's fantastic! :)

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  4. You need help with any of that, let me know. And DLP is interested in fantasy.

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  5. My dream has always been to live in a castle in England, too!

    As for the writing to get easier. We writers all wish for that. The promoting and marketing doesn't get easier either. It is what it is, but I still love it. Wouldn't want to be doing anything else. Congratulations on nearly finishing your first book!

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  6. Congrats on getting to the home stretch. I hope you'll teach us all about everything else you learn once you move to the next phase.

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  7. Congrats on this big step! I am so excited for you and your progress.

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  8. Good luck with finishing your first draft! You can do it!!

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  9. Congrats on getting so far with that first draft! That's great :)

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  10. And congrats from me too. The writing NEVER gets easier. In fact it gets harder as you learn about all the things you might do wrong.

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  11. That all sounds wonderful. Particularly the castle and JK teatime, of course, but having the marketing run on automatic is also a dream of mine. There are the automatic post scheduling apps, and there must be other time savers out there. Time for more research for me!

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  12. Congrats on finishing your draft! I am so glad you’re able to dream of publishing several more books. Once I got my first personal essay published in an anthology in 2015, I also dreamt of more, but somehow, this never got off the ground.

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  13. Well done, and I wish every success in the new decade 🤗

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  14. Congrats, you are further along than me. You go.

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  15. Well done on closing in on the finish line of your first draft, Ken! That's worth celebrating! I hope that your writing dream comes true! All the best, especially during this busy holiday season!

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  16. Congrats on being SO close to finishing that draft. Castle, castle, CASTLE! Sign me up for one of those, too, please.

    As for the non-writing part of the business - blech. I halfway think that's why I'm dragging my feet on getting to the complete stage of my current WIP.

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  17. Congrats on reaching the home stretch of your journey, as well as the next phase of your career, Ken. Sounds exciting. Keep going!
    Hope you have a wonderful Christmas and a Prosperous New Year!

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