Last week, I went to Laini Taylor’s book signing at Mysterious Galaxy. She’s one of those rare writers that is both skillful at plot and masterful with language. She started off by sharing her experience of writing Daughter of Smoke and Bone. And as she talked about how she writes, her process rang so many bells for me.

Laini uses Scrivener to write, my most beloved and essential word processing program.

It takes her much, much longer to write/revise the first third of her book compared to the rest of it. Me too.

I can't WAIT to read Daughter of Smoke and Bone!

And what really struck me… she loves writing and rewriting the same paragraph, trying to get it just right. It was the way she described doing this, the way her eyes lit up when she talked about perfecting those words and phrases, that made me realize I’d recently forgotten something very important in my own writing.

Savoring the process.

Harbinger was written over the course of years and years. Writing and rewriting and reworking. Learning how you put a story together. So when my first book went into the editing process it was already a solid story. Sure I wrote new stuff and changed a lot of old stuff, but the framework was already there.

Now that I’m writing my second book on a schedule, creating whole new worlds and characters, I’m trying to figure out how to play like myself. How long does it take me to write a rough draft? How much time do I need for a revision? How many chapters can I revise per week? The last 6 months have been an eye-opening, terrifying process, not unlike speeding down the first hill on a roller coaster. So far, here’s what I’ve learned about myself.

• I like world building much more than I would’ve guessed. And creating a world before writing a rough draft is not only a life saver, but really fun!

• I can write a rough draft pretty quickly and, though it doesn’t come out awesome, the speed serves me. It gives me the DNA of my story, letting me understand exactly what my story is about. And letting me see what needs to be expanded and developed. More than that, it gives me a chance to get early notes from my editor, agent, and critique groups, which is hard on my ego, but good for my story.

• I like to have breathing room during while I’m revising. When I first started this revision, I asked my editor if we could push the deadline back by 2 weeks so I could go through my book twice. Once for plot fixes and the second time to craft the language. Now I realize that plot and language are inseparable to me.I want to sink into my revision, like lowering myself into a swimming pool. Under the water it is a whole different world…sound, light, and color are transformed. It’s joyous to pull yourself through the cool water and just as wonderful to break through the surface to catch your breath. I love this process and trying to pull it apart and speed through it was ruining it for me. So now, I plan to go through the book once, but to savor it while I’m there.

I’ve heard many, many, many writers say that the second book is the hardest, but I just didn’t believe them. Somehow, I thought I’d be exempt from that struggle. Now I get it. Like Miles Davis says, you have to learn to play like yourself. And though the learning can be painful, the playing is heaven.

Of course, I didn’t think that writing a second book would be easy. I just thought I’d feel more confident about… well… everything!

And my obvious, but mind blowing, realization is this: Publishing doesn’t change you. At least not in the ways you think it might.

When you put your fingers on the keyboard, they aren’t any less hesitant. When you share pages with critiques groups and agents and editors, it doesn’t make your stomach flip-flop any less. And it doesn’t make the soul-gripping longing in the center of your chest burn any less fiercely. In fact, for me at least, getting published has magnified these things.

Now there are expectations.

A lot of you out there, who are wiser than me, probably already knew this. In fact, I already knew this. I’ve heard quite a few talented and prolific authors give speeches on this very topic. But I guess I didn’t know it know it.

Because here I am, wondering why I’m so nervous. Wondering why I’m not feeling more at home in my writing. And the answer is: Nothing outside yourself can change these feelings.

I have to write because I love it. Not because I want to be published. Or a bestseller. Or well-liked. Writing because I love doing it is the only way I’m going feel at home on the page.

I have to think my book is good enough. Not wait for an reviewer, agent, editor, or award committee to tell me these things. Not that it’s not nice when they do tell you. But that’s the only way I’m going to be confident.

I find that thought both comforting and terrifying. Because it means I have the power to be these things. And because I wonder if I’m actually capable of achieving them.

And then one more thought pops into my mind. Maybe it’s okay to doubt my writing. Maybe it’s okay to feel a little uncomfortable. Maybe these things push me a better writer. Or maybe the secret lies in a hidden, perfect place somewhere in between.

“I feel that I am transcribing verbatim from a flow of language running through the room, an ink current into which I dip the pen. It is a dark stream, swift running, a twisting flow that never doubles back.” – Louise Erdrich

And while this invokes beautiful images in my mind, this is nothing like my writing process. Especially right now. I’m working on a new book and I would equate the process to something much less poetic.

Well, there are lots of things I could compare it to… but most of them would be inappropriate here. So I’m going with…

The Oregon Trail.

I’m, of course, talking about the video game. In elementary school, this was always our free-day activity. I remember feeling like it took forever to set up… choosing a profession, buying supplies, assembling your team of oxen. And then the real fun started. One by one your party would get dysentery or break their leg or slowly starve or freeze.  And then there was the river.

The river was my true nemesis. You could choose to take a ferry or to try crossing it yourself. But whatever choice I made ended with disaster. The ferry leaked and sank. The oxen drowned. The Loch Ness monster stole my bullets. I lost my food and supplies and people. Over and over. Every time.

And yet I kept playing the game. Certain that next time I would get it right. This is what I feel like with my new book.

If you’re writing fantasy or sci-fi or historical fiction (or sometimes even with contemporary) you have a lot of details to nail down. Creating a new world for your story is a task fraught with peril. Did you give your characters the right tools? The right information? The right character traits to find their way through your plot? If not, can you forge ahead anyway, letting the plot develop in its own way? Or do you have to start over and try again with a different beginning?

And that river. That dreaded river is the 1/3 mark in my book. By the time I get there, I realize that I’ve learned so much about my world and about my characters that if I try to push on, everything will fall apart. And so I start over. Reimagining. Resuppling. Hoping that this time my story will survive.

And unlike The Oregon Trail game… I know that I’ll eventually get it right. And I can only be thankful that surviving this story doesn’t depend on aiming a pixelated rifle at an erratically moving deer. But it helps to be patient and trust your process. Often you need to complete your world before you can move forward. Then, at some point, you forge ahead into the unknown and hope you made the right choices. Hope your oxen stay healthy. Hope the ferry makes it across the river. Cause Oregon Trail got one thing right… taking risks is the only way to play.

Some people suggest that when writing crucial scenes in your book, you should employ at least three out of the five senses. As in: “Sara listened to the computer hum impatiently while she tried to think of a good example. She stalled, grimacing as she took a gulp of bitter coffee-gone-cold. The shiny, smooth keys of her computer beckoned her to be brilliant, but alas, she wrote this instead.”

This is a great technique and I like to expand it to the story creation process. Because unless the world feels real to you, in all five senses, it’s not going to feel real to the reader. Bringing your fiction into the physical world anchors you in your character’s voice and setting in a way that nothing else does. So in the past I’ve talked about building dioramas, collecting shoe boxes full of stuff my character loves, and, most importantly for me, finding a soundtrack to my story.

In my last project, I incessantly listened to the soundtrack to Battlestar Galactica, letting its Taiko drums and wailing flutes build tension and tone in my writing space. I can’t help but feel that the words are infused with a sense of that music, much like honey is flavored by the flowers that bees visit.

So when I started a new story, I felt lost without music for my new world. I started avidly listening to the radio, asking friends what they were listening to, paying attention to soundtracks in movies. At the same time, I was searching for the voice of my main character. For a while, writing was frustrating, my words feeling more like an outline than a book. Then I found Sigur Ros.

This Icelandic band has a raw tone that feels bleak and wistful and, occasionally, soaringly hopeful. The first song I heard by them stunned me. I could literally see one of my key scenes unfolding in my mind. It was like being given a key to this world I had been circling and spying on for so long. Suddenly, I could walk with my character through the streets of my story. Amazingly, when my husband heard the same song later, he had the same experience. For weeks I’d been talking about this world, about this character, bouncing ideas off of him, and this song triggered the same emotions in him as it did in me.  Now I could not only visualize my world, I could hear it too. And in the space of one song, my story had come to life.

Click here to view the embedded video.

See, during the past months of revision, I daydreamed about starting a new story. I’d sit next to a waterlily-filled pond somewhere, seized by inspiration, scribbling down long, brilliant paragraphs. (Why a pond? Especially since Laptop+Water= Tragedy) Anyway, my thoughts would weave themselves together, creating a manuscript with a beginning you couldn’t put down, an intriguing middle, AND a surprising, yet inevitable ending.

Instead, I’ve found the process of writing a first draft just like I remembered it, clumsy and full of doubt. And clumsy isn’t fun. Surprisingly, neither is doubt.

And suddenly, I wished I was revising again. In hindsight, revision seems like strolling through a lovely greenhouse, rearranging plants, watering this one here, pruning that one there. Now, I find myself back on a dusty plain with a handful of seeds and a empty watering can. True, I can create whatever I want in this vast open space, but first I have to find some water, figure out what kind of seeds I have, and get digging. All of this is awkward, hard work that leaves your hands calloused and caked with mud.

Wow. Sorry, I guess I got a little carried away with myself there. Plus now, I have two competing metaphors. Puppies and gardening. Hmmm… better throw in a third one, just for good measure.

Vroom! Meep, Meep!

Right now, in the middle of my first draft, I can hear the Road Runner, I can see him, but he just keeps racing in dizzying circles around me. For the last few weeks, I’ve been forging ahead anyway. Since I know my beginning and I know my ending, surely I can find a path between the two points. But somewhere in the middle there, the story gets boring. And I’ve learned to heed the warning signs. When you sit down to write a scene and you think to yourself, ‘Ugh!’ then whoever reads it is going to think ‘Ugh!’ too.

I’ve figured out that something is missing in my story and it’s as elusive and taunting as the Road Runner himself. But this morning and every morning, I will sit down at my computer and start again, creating contraptions, building traps, and scheming new schemes. After all, I’m Wile E. Coyote, Suuuuuper Gen-i-us and I’m bound to catch him sometime, right?

Right?

So I finished my revision… now what?  As a way to deal with the dismal No Man’s Land that lurks between revisions and new projects, I’ve been getting crafty.  This past September at the SCBWI Working Writers’ Retreat, the creative Julie Williams gave us some unusual ideas about how to build an authentic world for our stories.  Found-book collages, paper dolls, and object-inspired writing exercises made me realize that there’s more to grounding yourself in a new world than outlines and brainstorms.

I’ve had some ‘in between’ time on my hands, so I pulled out my notes for my next book and got to work.  Or play, rather.  You can see I’ve made a mess. But that’s what it’s all about.  Or is that the hokey-pokey?

As I construct this world in a literal, hands-on way, specific and rich details are floating into my brain like gifts from the ether.  Scenes have begun playing themselves out in front of me and characters are finding forms.

It’s been a fantastic way to travel from the analytical territory of revisions to the open space of creation. And it’s reminded me that this whole venture is supposed to be fun.  Here’s a peek at the world I’m just starting to imagine.

It’s wonderful to be presented with delicious stories and get to dream alongside the creators. I don’t have the stress of actually having to come up with the ‘right’ solution. I don’t have to judge the worthiness of my ideas. I just hand them over to someone else who has to do the tough stuff. It’s brainstorming without consequences.

The experience has taught me a lot about my own revision process. The pressure and restrictions I put on myself to ‘solve’ my problems. Now, I hope to bring some of the freedom and creativity that I felt on the sidelines into my own work.

Starting a story is actually my favorite part. It’s fresh and perfect and you’re sure that this time you’re going to be able to put it all down exactly like it is in your head. If I could spend my life writing the first 20 pages of stories, I would.

Unfortunately, you have to move on to page 21 and page 59 and page 167. Oh yes. They’re out there right now. Waiting for you.

But for now, I’m in bliss. I’m starting a new story and I’m using everything I’ve learned with the YA novel I’ve been slaving away on to help me get started. Suddenly, outlining is my friend. Character development. Story arcs. Research. I’m no longer afraid that these things will take the magic out of the story. And I’m already wielding them with stealthy ninja skill.

Also, I recently discovered Scrivener. It’s one of the many great writing programs out there. With it, I can compile my research all in one place. I can create notecards of my chapters and tack them up on virtual corkboards. I can see 2 documents I’m working on at the same time. I can use my nunchucks to bring rogue words into line! Oops. Got a bit carried away there.

But all the computer programs and notecards and sparkly pens in the world don’t change what I have to do. I need to sit down and, as quickly and truly as possible, disgorge the story. The dream draft, someone once called it. More like the technicolor yawn of words.