This is our first week with the blog chain and Icy Roses over at From Elysium kicked us off with a great question. What's the hardest part about writing? Be sure to stop by her blog and see what she had to say - good stuff!
I thought about this question and was surprised at my lack of answers. I thought I'd have a whole list! I'm thinking this is a positive thing. Since writing is my passion I'm liking the idea of not having too many road blocks in the way. Here it goes...
What is the hardest part of writing?
1. Distractions
Without a doubt researching the industry, blogging, emails and all that have been a major bump in the road for me. I wrote my first novel in a few months in one straight shot of staying up till all hours of the night every night then revising not long after. Once I started connecting with other writers and sending out queries and now especially with waiting to hear back from an agent, I've gotten sidetracked. Big time. I've started five new books but keep getting stuck on waiting on the first ones fate. I know, I know, you have to write it, get it out there and move on and keep writing! I'm working on it. At least I'm distracted by things related to writing. That's gotta count for something.
2. Editing
I had no idea how hard it was to edit your own work. Really hard for me. It's torture to look at your work with an outsiders eye. I tried to read through my manuscript as a "reader" and found it nearly impossible because I was so critical. It doesn't help that I'm not the best at knowing the proper places to use commas or get confused on the whole then/than thing and that sort of stuff. I ended up getting help from my incredible sister who sat with me until 1am a few nights and read the whole book aloud so we could make the edits needed on my laptop. Thanks Jenn!
Seriously that's all I have, just two things! Pretty good huh? I have no problem coming up with ideas, characters or pulling the plot together. If I could get over my issue of being distracted I'd be golden. The editing thing is a much easier fix. Gee, maybe I should get my sorry self off this blog and get some writing done.
Be sure to check out these other writers blogs this week for their response to this question. It's really interesting to see what we each struggle with. I'm betting distraction will be a common theme.
Monday: From Elysium
Wednesday: Girl With a Notebook
Thursday: Lin Wang - Teen Writer
Friday: Somewhere Nowhere in My Kingdom
5 comments:
This is a great blog chain! I think the hardest part of writing for me is trying to sort through what I think others want to read and what I want to write, if that makes sense. It's a hard balance.
I completely agree about the distractions... here I am right now playing in my google reader instead of wriring!! Argh!
Yeah, distractions are very annoying. But I hand my work over to a nit-picking relative of mine because I'm horrible at editing my own work (writer-tinted glasses).
Surprisingly enough, I don't struggle as much with distractions as I struggle with some other things... Well, more about that later when I blog ^^
Editing is really hard! Actually, though, I like editing my own stuff more than other people's because I feel bad criticizing someone else's work. If it's mine, I feel free to go crazy and mark it all up with red ink. I can't hurt my own feelings. :-)
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