Multi-tasking
Jul. 8th, 2004 04:22 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
msagaraHaving almost finished the requested revisions for one project (I'm waiting to get something clarified before I can actually say done and heave both a sigh of relief and a manuscript out the door), I'm getting back to writing the novel I put aside to work on revisions. [I've been finishing up the Sunburst Jury award work as well.]
Which is sort of my excuse for being so darn slow to get up to speed on HOUSE WAR again.
When I was younger, I found switching between projects almost a relief. I'm not sure if it was due to the fact that I had no children then, and that there was nothing therefore consuming emotional energy and time in the particular fashion; I do think about this a lot. Why? Because I think I'm becoming, in novel terms, a serial monogamist.
It takes me a while to sink the emotional roots I need to have in place into any novel, and when I move to a different project, I seem -- these days -- to uproot them all. When I come back, I have to give myself a big mental slap, and change speed, tone and direction -- all of which would be easier; I have to find the emotional threads and bindings, which is harder than it used to be.
So I'm sort of wondering how many people here can work on two books at once, and how they manage to do it if they can. I can take short story breaks, but I think this has more to do with the differing processes of the two media.
Which is sort of my excuse for being so darn slow to get up to speed on HOUSE WAR again.
When I was younger, I found switching between projects almost a relief. I'm not sure if it was due to the fact that I had no children then, and that there was nothing therefore consuming emotional energy and time in the particular fashion; I do think about this a lot. Why? Because I think I'm becoming, in novel terms, a serial monogamist.
It takes me a while to sink the emotional roots I need to have in place into any novel, and when I move to a different project, I seem -- these days -- to uproot them all. When I come back, I have to give myself a big mental slap, and change speed, tone and direction -- all of which would be easier; I have to find the emotional threads and bindings, which is harder than it used to be.
So I'm sort of wondering how many people here can work on two books at once, and how they manage to do it if they can. I can take short story breaks, but I think this has more to do with the differing processes of the two media.
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no subject
Date: 2004-07-14 08:34 pm (UTC)Don't take this the wrong way, but I -loved- the ending of that book. Maybe you had an ending in mind that I would have loved better -- but at this point, I can't imagine it; the ending that was there was perfect. To me. As a reader.
On rec.arts.sf.composition once, this sort of thing came up, and people seemed to split into two camps, those who re-read and like it and think "I'll never do anything this good again!" and those who re-read and think "All these flaws! And too late, too late!"
Whereas I do both. While I'm working on a novel, it is All Garbage and No One Will Ever Read Me Again (and will also say, I waited Two Years for -this-??). Everything that I read prior to what I'm working on seems almost brilliant in comparison and I pull out much hair and weep with vexation. And then the Work comes back for proofing, and I -also- do the "all these flaws!" response.
Writer's Ego. You have to love it. Or not <g>.
no subject
Date: 2004-07-15 06:17 am (UTC)I'm glad somebody does.
I don't mean the very end, the last chapter from Ferdia's POV after he's dead, that's right. (I also didn't write that last, which considering that I always write in order is astonishing.) What's not right is the two chapters immediately before that. I was constrained by its prequel nature, but all the same... I went too far too soon, and I don't suppose I'll ever be happy with it.
It's good to know that other people can like it.