Writer's Journey: I Have an Idea for a Novel. NOW WHAT???
So I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the beginning of me writing. I don’t mean the literal beginning, the one in which I’m a little girl with a notebook and a bunch of fancy glittery pens. I’m talking about when I graduated with my master’s degree and took the plunge. I was writing full-time back then, and teaching piano and guitar lessons in the afternoon to pay the bills.
It took seven and a half years and…I actually lost count of how many manuscripts before the first sale finally came. I do know I wracked up far more than 1,000 rejections before I sold that book. I mean, that first book, A Blue So Dark, was rejected 86 times. That’s from agents and editors, over multiple rounds of revision and resubmission. And that was just one book. I’d been writing book after book after book for seven and a half years. Far more than 10 manuscripts. So…
Yeah.
Back when I took the plunge, in 2001, I didn’t have internet access in my home. I had a dinosaur of a computer that didn’t even have a modem in it. I had the love of the written word. That was pretty much it. Because even though I had a degree, I had zero experience. I had not yet written a novel to completion.
I’ve been thinking about all the guesswork. I’ve been thinking about how those early manuscripts felt just like stumbling around in the dark.
I’ve learned so much from trial and error. I didn’t really realize quite how much I’d learned until I began to offer editorial services.
Putting together my first writing course really lit something inside me. I can only describe the feeling as suddenly realizing you’re sitting on something you shouldn’t be.
At least, not by yourself.
Every single new writer should not have to spend seven and a half years digging out the same truths I did. Just imagine how storytelling could progress if a young writer started with the foundation it took me all that time to build for myself.
I want to start a series, running both here and on my YouTube channel: I Have an Idea for a Novel. Now What???
The series will run on Mondays here at Substack. It will aim to get all new writers through the very first draft. As all of us who have stuck with writing know, it’s the most daunting task of all: actually finishing the first draft of the first book.
I want to invite new writers to sit on my bench with me, let me share some of the things I’ve learned along the way. Starting here next Monday.