I\u2019m happy happy happy to announce that A Tale of Two Castles<\/i> is out! Released yesterday, and I\u2019m now on tour. Thanks to all you blog readers for your support and eagerness to read the book! Thanks to those of you who weighed in on the title, and more thanks to April for the actual title. This is my nineteenth book, not counting my early, unpublished efforts, and it never ceases to be thrilling.<\/p>\n
New on the website is another stop on my book tour, this one in New York City on May 28th. Hope to see a few of you there or at the other events on my tour.<\/p>\n
Also, the absolute final cover of Forgive Me, I Meant to Do It<\/i>, is posted on the website, and I think it\u2019s a hoot. There\u2019s no poem in the book to go with it; my editor said no, but I did write one. I don\u2019t think I posted it on the blog before, so here it is, a blog exclusive:<\/p>\n
This Is Just to Say<\/p>\n
I have taken a chomp
\nout
\nof your precious boat
\non its maiden voyage<\/p>\n
which
\nyou optimistically
\nhoped would take you
\naround the world<\/p>\n
Forgive me
\nI need
\nmore fiberglass
\nin my diet<\/p>\n
End of poem. Please laugh.<\/p>\n
On March 4, 2011, Kilmeny of the Ozarks wrote, A couple of posts back you mentioned how often you restart your book. Does that ever make it hard to meet deadlines? I’m having a problem somewhat like this. I’m a “planner” and have to know my plot outline, characters and setting before I start the first draft. And right now I’m taking a course on novel writing from the Institute of Children’s Literature. I’m on my fourth assignment, where I’m supposed to write the first third of my novel. The problem is, when I started to do the edits my instructor noted on my chapter outline–my entire plot changed. Completely. My main character moved out of the real world into the fantasy world and her quest changed, etc. So I had to rewrite that and redo my characters… and I’m still not done. My deadline is in mid April, and I’m afraid I won’t be able to meet it. I guess what I’m asking is: how can I work on this “pre-planning” (characters, setting, research) while also writing? Sorry, I know it\u2019s confusing. Maybe I just need some organizational tips!<\/i>
\nAnd Charlotte wrote, I agree with Kilmeny of the Ozarks–it would be great to see a post about writing with deadlines. Personally, I’ve been working on the same novel for a little over five years now, and I’ve changed and changed and changed the entire plot over and over. It gets me worried that I’ll never finish–and as I want to write books for a living, this is kind of problematic!
\n How long did Ella take to write? Did you do a lot of editing before sending it to publishers? How did you know when you were done?<\/i><\/p>\n
I can write about only my own method, and right now it seems as if I work like someone blindfolded, wearing oven mittens, and trying to repair a watch! I don\u2019t outline. Whenever I\u2019ve tried I haven\u2019t been able to stick with the plan. Research is somewhat different, but I don\u2019t know how to pre-plan my characters and my setting except in the most rudimentary way. Everything shifts once I start. Even my research needs change. A Tale of Two Castles<\/i> is set in a fantasy Middle Ages, so I read about daily life during the period, but when I needed to know about medieval banquets, I returned to the books. (I don\u2019t want to pass the novel off as historically accurate. It\u2019s not. When my plot was incompatible with the facts, the facts went out the window.)<\/p>\n
As far as deadlines go, I try to make mine distant enough that I don\u2019t have to stress over meeting them. This mystery novel that\u2019s giving me so much trouble isn\u2019t due until 2014. At this point I\u2019m still pretty secure about making it.<\/p>\n
For those who don\u2019t know, if a writer misses a deadline with a book, the book gets rolled over to the publisher\u2019s next list, the next season. My editor assures me this wouldn\u2019t ever be a problem, but I suspect otherwise. Editors move to other publishing houses. Publishers change direction. It\u2019s best to be on time if you can.<\/p>\n
Revision deadlines are tighter, but I\u2019m a revising warrior and I blast straight through. I\u2019m known for meeting deadlines, which, I think, gives editors a nice comfort level.<\/p>\n
BUT meeting a deadline comes second to making the story as good as you can make it, and often that can\u2019t be rushed. Of course, some working writers don\u2019t have the luxury of lengthy rewriting and repeated fresh starts if the deadline can\u2019t be moved. Then they have to settle for the best they can do in a limited time. Kilmeny of the Ozarks, I missed your mid-April deadline, but for others who are taking courses or attending school, this is another situation where you may have to accept a result you\u2019re not entirely satisfied with. You have to meet school deadlines or sacrifice a good grade, but you can continue with your revisions later if the project interests you.<\/p>\n
Kilmeny of the Ozarks, I hope the instructor\u2019s comments that caused all your changes were helpful, even exciting and you thought something like, Wow! If I do this, then I can do that, and it will work in this new way I never thought of before.<\/i> When I make a u-turn in a manuscript, it\u2019s usually because I\u2019ve glimpsed a better way to go forward. I may not celebrate the hundred or two hundred or three hundred pages I have to rewrite, but probably I should. The understanding I come to, which seems obvious in hindsight, I couldn\u2019t have reached without the blunders.<\/p>\n
Every writer has a unique process. You may have to re-outline. Do it or you try a different way of working. I think it\u2019s good advice when possible to just keep going when the story changes, advice that I often don\u2019t have the self control to follow. A friend once told me one should continue even if the gender of the main character changes! I can\u2019t, not when the underlying assumptions of a story shift. Otherwise I soldier on.<\/p>\n
When rewriting against a deadline, when actually writing, not taking a shower or walking the dog, put the deadline out of your mind. It\u2019s a distraction. You\u2019re doing the work, which is hard enough without also worrying.<\/p>\n
Writing speed varies from writer to writer. Some of us can bang out a novel in three months, some in five years. Ella Enchanted<\/i> took me two years and I was working full-time at a non-writing job; Fairest<\/i> took four years and I had quit my day job. Sometimes it depends on the book. Charlotte, you may spend seven years on this book and finish the next one in six months. I find that my struggle alternates: hard book (hard to write), easier, hard, easier. I suspect my subconscious is so exhausted by the difficult ones that it sends me a simpler project next.<\/p>\n
On the other hand, maybe what your subconscious is sending up is fear, fear of finishing, fear of sending your work out, fear of rejection, fear of never having another good idea. All of these fears are unsurprising, whether you have them or other readers of the blog do. So maybe it\u2019s time to stick with the latest plot, improve it as much as you can, and move on. Whatever happens to it ultimately, you\u2019ve learned from the writing.<\/p>\n
The worth of a book has nothing to do with how long it took to write. The reader doesn\u2019t know if we spent a decade laboring over it or a fevered twenty-one days. He can\u2019t tell if we revised a gross of times or if it went straight from our computers to the copy editor, who didn\u2019t change even a comma.<\/p>\n
I had a lot of help with Ella<\/i>. I was taking a writing class and I belonged to a critique group, but that didn\u2019t stop me from detouring two-hundred pages while my teacher and my critique buddies kept wondering out loud where I was going. When I got back on track I did revise a great deal. I always know I\u2019m done when I find myself changing words and then changing them back.<\/p>\n
Writing is weird and mysterious. We control the story and yet it feels like we have no control at all. And both are true.<\/p>\n
Prompt time!<\/p>\n
\u2219 Your main character, Eraxo, has an awful case of writer\u2019s block and a looming deadline. Although his writing is blocked, his ingenuity isn\u2019t. In the time freed up by not writing he invents a device to slow time and give himself as long as he needs to work through his writing paralysis. He sits at his strange machine, dons the headset, turns the dials, lifts the levers, and pushes the start button. Everything works. He\u2019s slowed time. But he discovers that place changes with time and that creatures live here who are invisible at humanity\u2019s ordinary tempo, and they are not happy about being discovered. What happens?<\/p>\n
\u2219 Your main character, Eraxa, recognizes she lacks the writing spark, but she wants it. She loves books and the glamour (ha!) of being an author, and her ethics are not strong. She\u2019s as clever as her brother Eraxo, so she invents a time-travel machine. She will go into the future and steal a bestseller, then return to the present and submit it to the book\u2019s publisher as her own. However, in the future she makes a dire discovery about the future of books and reading and publishing. When she returns to the present she has new and unexpected choices that challenge her questionable moral fiber, her courage, and her foresight. What happens?<\/p>\n
Have fun, and save what you write!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I\u2019m happy happy happy to announce that A Tale of Two Castles is out! Released yesterday, and I\u2019m now on tour. Thanks to all you blog readers for your support and eagerness to read the book! Thanks to those of you who weighed in on the title, and more thanks to April for the actual […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[182],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=173"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":451,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173\/revisions\/451"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=173"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=173"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gailcarsonlevine.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=173"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}