February Writing Challenge: The Final Push
The closer you get to the end, the slower you go
Days 18 & 19
You’d think I’d be excited since I’m so close to the end — and I am — but it’s also challenging. I can see where I want to go, but building the road to get there, brick by brick, is laborious. I start to want to take shortcuts. I wonder how it’s all going to come together. I remember the subplot whose resolution I have to weave in (where will that go?).
There’s also the bittersweetness of a big project ending. Of course, I want this draft to be over. But then I have to face the revision process. And then I have to start sending it out… but more than that, it’s letting go of this discovery phase. While this draft won’t be set in stone, it will be a complete story. Whatever I do around this story in the future will be in relation to this version of it. My mind will be less open to new ideas for it, and more in the mode of working with what’s on the page. This isn’t a bad thing. If I just kept iterating ideas forever, I’d never have a book. The key is to embrace whatever stage I’m at. And it is still very much in process.
Days 20–24
These have been something of a blur. I’ve been caught up in trying to figure how to end this stupid thing. And sidetracked by writing blog posts, and other writing…
