I have a lot of projects I cycle through. I cannot focus on one and so I think I may never finish a single book. YET. I know they are in me. These stories. Stories that could change the world. Or at least a life. I feel it. I know it . I AM SUPPOSED TO WRITE.
Here's my main problem. When I write I am so focused on the publishing aspect that I focus from the beginning on what I need to put in my story to get it published. Problem: it isn't me and my story gets lost or I get lost and exit my story.
This has happened twice and both times it has happened on stories that came to me like I stuck my finger in a socket, but instead of my hair popping all over the place my whole insides filled up with the story. The feeling that I want to come off the page when it's read, the characters. I feel inside how I want readers to feel while they read it but especially at the end.
It's like a drug.
I read endless books searching for that feeling
but I don't ever find exactly what I am looking for.
Because it isn't out there.
It isn't.
It's already inside ziping around, my fingers tingling with the will to put it out there.
On paper.
So I guess through all of that I am saying that regardless of being published I think it makes you a writer to put your words down. How you want them.
And even if my books never got published, the being finished is the important thing
because if they are my words on the page
and they mean a lot to me
and it sounds and feels and is how I want it
then THAT is what matters.
I am not talking about having a problem if publishers want changes to make it sell better. They aren't always going to be bad.
BUT if you, in your heart, know that the changes they WANT to make, or you think they might TRY to make don't hold true to your story look elsewhere (if that's the stage you are in) or just write it without regards to publishing.
Because maybe. Just maybe. They want to hear what you have to say how you have to say it.
You are the artist afterall.
The Last Olympian by Rick Riordan
