Is Sucking Compulsory While Writing a Novel?

[Cirias]

I just hit 10k words in my WIP and am roughly 10% done (woohoo!). The first two chapters I wrote to introduce my protagonists felt like they were really well written and I stormed through them. Now, a couple more chapters in, I feel as if I'm just getting the story down. I feel like less of an artist and more of a builder, slapping down bricks and cementing them in place before they topple over. I'm pleased, because this is the smoothest any of my WIPs have gone so far and I feel like this story will actually get finished because, unlike before, I know every event and theme inside out. My chapters are easily hitting the 3000 words mark before I even have the end in sight, which is a contrast to my previous writing in which I would struggle to fill 1500 words. But I still have that nagging voice in my ear that tells me what I'm putting down on paper is absolute trash.

Now, I know this is a natural part of writing. It's not going to deter me from finishing this story, because I only get more enthusiastic the further I get through the story. This is the first time I've felt like this while working on a story. It's kind of chaotic, but I'm writing over 500 words a day, which is nice. I'm now worried I'll need loads more than my self-prescribed 100k words to finish this thing. That is something I never thought I'd say.

What about you guys? I already feel motivated, but I love to hear everyone's experiences on stuff like this.

[CharlotteAshley]

What about you guys? I already feel motivated, but I love to hear everyone's experiences on stuff like this.

Yah, the "sucking" comes in waves for me. Some days I think I'm brilliant, others I know I am doing Good Work, and other days I feel like a complete fraud. The Imposter Syndrome is strong with me. :/ On those days I feel like I just need some good news to keep going - positive feedback from a beta, a hopeful rejection, a job inquiry, anything.

But even if that doesn't come in, I have to keep working anyway. I am "trapped" at my desk - I have 9 hours to blow, and if I don't write, what will I do? So I write anyway, even when I'm feeling like there's absolutely no point.

And sometimes I come back to what I've written on those days and it's not bad.... so I know the next time to just bull through.

[Noumenon]

*Googles "Importeur Syndrome", looks at recommendations, assumes you meant "Imposter Syndrome", and returns*

I'm also making decent headway on my WIP, and I felt a similar way at the end of last week: starting out on a new chapter and feeling dissatisfied with how it went down on paper (provoked by finding the previous chapter harder and harder to complete, and it still isn't). I stopped and skipped ahead to a bit that seemed appealing to write, and I'm progressively more pleased with what has resulted.

Now I'm undecided about how to continue: I could either ride that momentum at the things I've been struggling with previously, or continue jumping towards what feels interesting now and pile up the rest for a potentially major grind later on.

Ultimately though, the answer to your original question depends entirely on how supportive your partner is...

[CharlotteAshley]

*Googles "Importeur Syndrome", looks at recommendations, assumes you meant "Imposter Syndrome", and returns*

Gak, yes! Autocorrect, wtf.

[Wulfen]

Ultimately though, the answer to your original question depends entirely on how supportive your partner is...

Dude, you're hilarious.

OT: I think every writer feels that. I'll write a story, excited to finish it, and then when I go back to it a few days later for edits some of the lines will make me cringe.

I've often hit that moment when I'm working on a longer piece. I'll get further into the story, hit that groove, and realize that I'll have to go back and change earlier scenes because they suck. Even if they really don't.

Glad to see you making progress, Cirias, that's awesome.

[choppy]

In a word... yes.

At least for me.

Maybe there are writers out there who can pound out a story on the edge of their seats, feeling satisfied with every sentence, every paragraph, every chapter, and have it culminate in a manuscript that they are certain is a masterpiece. And of those writers, there may even be a couple for whom that's actually true.

But if you figure that within a rough draft of a manuscript, you can ALWAYS find a section that you can improve, parts to tweak or re-write entirely, then it's obvious that writing out something you're going to be completely happy with the first go round is impossible. Whether "can be improved" amounts to "sucking" or not is a matter of opinion.

Of course then the question becomes when does it stop sucking enough that you can send it out. You could, in theory, just keep polishing a single manuscript until it's so over-the-top fantabulous, and still not feel completely happy with it.

The answer, I suspect, comes with experience. Send your work out for feedback. Use multiple sources. Build up an experience base so that you learn where the bar is with respect to your own work.

[KatG]

Writing fiction is a conversation between your left brain and your right brain. Your left brain proposes ideas, asks questions, states requirements. Your right brain tries to fulfill the requirements, answers the questions, provides language and imagery, and plays with the ideas. It is very close to your dream state, in which images simply flash. Your left brain then takes the raw material and chooses and refines the images, ideas, language and question answers, inching towards the final form. This goes back and forth very fast, often instantaneously. While it isn't compulsory, about seventy percent of a first draft is usually raw, poorly formed material from the right brain and the other thirty percent may be filled with basically just short notes from your left brain rather than full text. It doesn't "suck," it's just clay without much form yet.

As you go along, your right brain gets tired and your left brain gets overwhelmed. It will vary depending on what's going on, but a slow down is your brain either trying to work out a tricky bit or being forced in a direction it's not sure it wants to go or can accomplish over other possibilities. Slow down slogs are points where it's good to assess if you are being too restrictive to your brain and not allowing that free interaction between right and left. Your Editor Hat -- the left brain in high gear -- may be donned too soon and needs to be saved for subsequent drafts. Your Inner Weasel is the one whispering that it sucks and needs to be kicked to the curb. The ms. might suck, but it's unlikely you'll know for sure until you get much further in or utterly bored, because right now all you've got is clay. It can't really suck because it isn't an actual story yet.

Author Patricia Wrede and others have a scale for this, which I've put here before, but since it's relevant, I'll do it again:

Level 1: the book
Level 2: the stupid book
Level 3: the damn book
Level 4: the &#$* book
Level 5-7: *#&#*

So right now you're on Level 2, maybe creeping on to Level 3. You are likely to go up and down. It's not compulsory, but it's very normal. Let your right brain and left brain work together, rather than trying to fight each other. That's not easy, but that's how the clay gets turned into something else. Or it may around page 200 fall apart and you realize it's just not clay that you can use, or bits of it can be cannibalized for a new story or variation. But give it a chance to suck for a bit. At the least you're learning things and training your brain.

[RedMage]

Thanks Kat, that helps. I've been in one of those slow downs the past week and a half since I put part of my story over to the workshop. For a few days of that I was in Wrede's Stage 3 at the very least. It's taken me that long to figure out a chapter that wasn't all that hard and, with what you've said, I now wonder if the reason I had such difficulty with it is not because of it but, rather, because I'm not sure how best to work in a new plot line into the 2nd draft of my wip that I'm working on. I think I've figured out the beginning of it, but I have no clue what to do with it next. Thankfully, I have plenty of other scenes that need going over and a different plot line needing further development.

[JRMurdock]

I have a tendency to write ridiculously fast. That said, I don't slow down enough to think if what I'm writing is crap or not. When I did that recently, I scrapped 25,000 words of a book and started over.

I like to try to not think about how good or bad a book is while I'm writing it. I prefer to just let the story happen and worry about if it's good or not when I'm done. That's when a lot of work begins with re-reading it, fixing broken places, patching plot holes, filling in missing details and descriptions. That's what re-writing is for. To make it better. Some people even literally write the same book a second time before they go back and start fixing (I've done this before as well).

Speed is the one thing that prevents me from worrying about a book until it's done. Currently I'm working a a book, I'm 10,000 words in after 3 days. I hope to have the entire thing done in 3 weeks (tops) then I'll go through the clean-up phase, see what works, what doesn't, rewrite some chapters, do some edits, and send it off to beta readers. They'll tell me real quick if it's good or if it's junk.

Keep in mind that an author is the worst person to judge their own work. Leave that to other people. Just write the best book you can. When you're done. Write another .

[KatG]

To quote Amy Tan, bestselling and award-winning author (who occasionally uses fantasy magic realism style):

I started a second novel seven times and I had to throw them away.

I sincerely hope that this happens to no one, but it can, and not just if you're writing high faluting stuff either.

[Igor]

I have a tendency to write ridiculously fast. That said, I don't slow down enough to think if what I'm writing is crap or not. When I did that recently, I scrapped 25,000 words of a book and started over.

I like to try to not think about how good or bad a book is while I'm writing it. I prefer to just let the story happen and worry about if it's good or not when I'm done. That's when a lot of work begins with re-reading it, fixing broken places, patching plot holes, filling in missing details and descriptions. That's what re-writing is for. To make it better. Some people even literally write the same book a second time before they go back and start fixing (I've done this before as well).

Speed is the one thing that prevents me from worrying about a book until it's done. Currently I'm working a a book, I'm 10,000 words in after 3 days. I hope to have the entire thing done in 3 weeks (tops) then I'll go through the clean-up phase, see what works, what doesn't, rewrite some chapters, do some edits, and send it off to beta readers. They'll tell me real quick if it's good or if it's junk.

Keep in mind that an author is the worst person to judge their own work. Leave that to other people. Just write the best book you can. When you're done. Write another .

I write fast too. Just did 5 chapters, 19,000 words of my fourth book in three days.
But I do have my wife read it all right then and comment early on so I can make immediate chance if needed.
Normally, if it does not work, it feels wrong, for me.
Igor

[Laer Carroll]

The good news is that the more you write the better matters become. In two ways. In one, your writing becomes better. After seven books (the first one being pretty sucky) I’ve become pretty good at turning out stuff fast and good. And unlike Wrede, I don’t hate my books more and more the closer I come to a finish. I like them more and more.

Our creative and critical sides CAN war with each other. But after a time we begin to learn to use them TOGETHER, the way we use our left and right hands together. That’s the second way we become better.

___________________________

Every writer will manage this left-brain/right-brain partnership differently. In my case I begin with a creative urge: an overall idea and a character or two at the heart of it. I immediately jump on the computer and write the one sentence or paragraph that will get my story off to a good start. Usually something short.

Then I pause and contemplate that sentence. That’s when my critical faculty comes to the fore. After so many years of writing I’m usually pretty happy with the sentence. However, that came with lots of practice. And I usually find some tiny ways to sharpen that sentence, even so.

That beginning is my promise to the reader that something good will come. It’s also my reminder, of what I plan to deliver. I come back to it time and time again.

Then I write a page, maybe three. Not agonizingly worrying about perfection the way I used to. During that hour or so my critical faculties are almost completely suspended.

Or they’re working along in my subconscious on the word and sentence level. For instance, when a paragraph seems to be becoming too long I’ll pause for a fraction of a second, think about it, make a lightning decision, and rush on.

Then I take a break. Maybe long minutes. Maybe a few seconds. Go to the bathroom. Freshen my drink. Walk to my balcony and spend some time watching the traffic below and the people on the sidewalks and the way the clouds are crossing the sky.

Then I go back and read those pages. Sharpen the text. Break or combine paragraphs. Add a character or action detail – and sometimes remove some. Add or rearrange dialogue.

Notice something here? I’m now working more on the second or third level up from the word and sentence and paragraph level. I’m thinking about bigger issues, of the people and their actions and possible future consequences. I’m not spending a lot of time on this, but I am working on it.

And all the time my creative and critical sides are working together.

___________________________

Finally, one comment. It helps (me at least) to think of every story as a succession of scenes or summaries of scenes, each one a succession of events with a definite beginning in time and space. (Not chapters, which can combine several short scenes. Or contain one long scene cut into chapters.)

I try to keep in mind the large overall structure of the story, several scenes performing some character or action arc, and the several arcs creating the entire book. My idea for those arcs may be, usually will be, very vague. This allows me the freedom to change them. But by having those arcs I have enough structure not to be completely lost in the vast seas of story possibilities.

And so I pass my days.

[Rogue Writer]

I started a novel in 2005 and after hundreds of pages of manuscript I have decided to start it all over. Rather annoying, but it happens.

[Laer Carroll]

I started a novel in 2005 and after hundreds of pages of manuscript I have decided to start it all over. Rather annoying, but it happens.

Annoying, but one of the marks of a pro writer is to learn to do this. You should count this as a victory. I'll bet you gained a number of things, such as various writing and time management skills, ideas for other stories, and bits and pieces you can use in other stories. (For instance, one of my secondary characters in a failed novelette turned out to be perfect as the main charactrer of a trilogy. I've finished the first two books, and am well on the way to finishing the finale.)

__________________

Self-doubt is sometimes good. I’ve learned to tell when it’s a handicap, and when it’s my subconscious telling me something useful. It might be telling me one of three pieces of info.

• The idea for a story is just plain bad. No one, certainly not me, should use it.
• I’m just not good enough (YET) to write the story, however great the idea is. For instance, for now I don’t have the skills to write a compelling mystery.
• I don’t like the idea well enough to spend all the time and energy and emotional stress needed to finish the book.

It’s not easy to tell when self-doubt is bad or good. But through experience we eventually can get a handle on telling which.