In case you missed the last announcement, author Tom Levenson has been running a multi-part series on the genesis of his latest book, Newton and the Counterfeiter (Available now. Pick up a copy!). One of the most recent entries is about, to borrow from Tom's title, "writing the damn thing", to which Chad Orzel has replied. Given that I still have a helluva lot of writing to do I am in a different place than both Tom and Chad, but I think my experiences might be of interest to other neophytes who are thinking of making the blog-to-book transition.
One of the greatest obstacles I had to overcome during the writing process was the fact that I am not a full-time science writer. I am not yet established enough to justify staying at home and writing all day. I receive a little bit of regular income from blogging, but I work an 8-hour day job to make sure the bills get paid. I simply do not have the luxury of spending the day researching and writing, and it is essential that I take advantage of the time I have during evenings and weekends.
This is why being committed to my project is so important. If I just waited to be inspired, for some grand idea to suddenly come to me as if by divine will, I would never get anything done. Composing a book really takes a professional attitude, and that means work. I was led to this realization by a slim little book called The War of Art by Steven Pressfield (better known as the author of The Legend of Bagger Vance). In all honesty I could probably live without most of Pressfield's advice, particularly his beliefs about muses and angels, but his insistence on writing like a professional stuck with me.
When I say "professional" here I do not mean dressing sharply or having crisp business cards. (Though both might help if you have to meet with a publisher!) No, writing a book requires that you act like it is your job to complete your manuscript, even if (especially if) you are not getting paid. This means showing up every day, cutting out whatever distractions you can, and getting down to the business of writing. It sounds easy enough, but some days it can be a real challenge.
Keep in mind that by "writing" I do not mean simply putting words on the page. If my book only required that I reach a particular word count I could be finished in about a week or two, but it would be a really lousy book. Instead, the act of writing a book involves grappling with how to move the story you are telling forward and how to lucidly describe your subject without being painfully long-winded. This requires a lot of persistence. Some days you might be "On" and make great progress while other days you will feel like you are struggling against the tide. Even if you ultimately delete what you spent all day yesterday working on, though, one of the most important parts of writing is showing up to do the work. It really makes it that much easier to come back the next day, especially if you have developed a good idea of where your story is going next.*
*[Another definition: Even if you're writing a non-fiction book you should still be telling a story. Whether it's an actual narrative about a person or the development of an idea, you cannot simply dump a list of facts on a page, bind it together, and call it a good book. If you want to spout off a litany of facts in succession, write a textbook instead.]
I didn't realize the importance of professionalism when I was first inspired to write a book about three years ago. I was naive when it came to what the project would require of me. When I started writing I was primarily doing it because it was fun, but I soon realized that if I am writing for my own pleasure alone I'm doing something wrong. Not only had I not given much thought to my potential audience, but it was easy to let things slip when I didn't feel like it. Finally there came a point when I grew tired of my own lazy approach and started to think about why I am writing and who I am writing for. Had I not made these considerations I definitely would not have come this far or come up with anything really worth publishing.
I do not write any of this to dissuade budding authors. These are just the realities of writing that I had never expected. I cannot speak for anyone else, but I initially had a reductionist view of writing where I assumed that if I could write an essay I could certainly write a book. Yet the book I am writing is not just a collection of disparate facts or a collection of essays. It is something grander and more cohesive, and as such it cannot be accomplished with anything short of my best effort.
I have no doubt that my writing habits will change as I continue writing. They will almost certainly have to. Yet there is no single formula that works for everyone. There's no simple recipe (take six hours, one computer, one author, two cups of coffee, some leftover Chinese food, &c.) to be followed, nor should there be. If there is anything I have learned about the writing and publishing process it is that there is so single path that everyone follows. There are common parts of every story (proposal->agent->publisher->&c.) but there is no standard trajectory between them.
Writing a book is one of those activities that can truly be called "a labor of love." There is more to it than simply transcribing everything you know about a given topic onto the page, and this is simultaneously rewarding and frustrating. I can think of little that I would rather be doing, though, and that has certainly helped me transform the idea that so enthused me into something more tangible.
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My own book-writing exploits have soured with the coming of summer (yardwork & housework...we've only got three months) but I expect to pick it back up come the fall. I can't tell you how much I've improved as a writer just by writing my silly little blog. I've adopted more stringant fact-checking habits and clearer language, but most of all, I've learned how to be succinct by defining my terms.
And I'm still improving!
I initially had a reductionist view of writing where I assumed that if I could write an essay I could certainly write a book.
This little mention jumped out at me, for 2 reasons.
1. I have recently had some conversations about books that included some disappointment that an excellent essay-writer (or newspaper column-writer, in a couple of cases) was not an excellent book-writer. The 2 skillsets don't overlap completely, I guess.
2. I have the occassional day-dream about writing, and I'd like to start by trying to write a few good essays. But from your comment, I suspect that would be rather more tangential than I thought to the process of becoming a person who writes books.
Anyways, been a long time since I dropped by. Congratulations on all that has apparently gone well for you in the past while.
Well said!
Any creative endeavour suffers the same problem as writing. The eight-hour day to pay bills, the (enjoyable!) commitments to spouse and family, maintaining friendships...it's mighty tough. You're so right Brian, you have to be professionally committed.
For myself, I'm reducing my blogging to a 5am-6am activity, and creating art from 9 until midnight. It's tough, but not doing it itches away at me.
I think everything you said is right on the mark. The main thing about writing is showing up and working, rain or shine, in the mood or not. This is true just as well with full-time writers and as a novelist I have to put in years of work before finding out if/how much I'm going to make on it. In the beginning that meant having a dayjob, which every writer has to start with unless the writer is independently wealthy or supported by family. Later that meant making the proceeds from writing stretch until the next book is finished and then going on from there. It's a precarious way to make a living but lots of other seemingly more secure ways are just that, seemingly. I know how hard it is to sustain a long-term project when you do have a dayjob, so I want to say good going! And keep at it. If you do find yourself getting tired, that isn't the end of the story. You just need to realize that you might need to get a schedule that carves out time on weekends, during holiday breaks, or whatever works for you. I wasn't able to work an 8 hour day and then work in the evening. I found that too tiring. I needed to have a part-time dayjob. I know of other people who teach and write during summers. Some people can put in a couple of hours in the morning. But somehow you can find a way.
Laurence Kasdan said, "writing is like having homework every night for the rest of your life." I don't think he meant it's drudgery, I think he meant you have to keep at it every day.
no intent to pee on your parade, but dude, you ain't written no books yet, so don't be telling us bout how it feels to write no stinking books, if you ain't done done it yet. when i walk over to borders and see your book on the shelf, THEN you can tell us all bout book writing. don't wanna hear bout no cart. get on the horse, boy! git! let's see some tracks . . . . . . . .
Good post.
One thing I've come to realize is that writing simply doesn't scale very well. As mentioned, a great essay writer may not write great books.
I personally notice this even with longer (6000+ word) essays. When only writing a few pages, it isn't difficult to conceive of and execute a narrative arc and overarching structure in the work. Doing this gets much, much harder as the length of th work increases.
Hey Brian...good post, and thanks for the shout-out.
Re writing like a pro: you are absolutely right. While everyone I know who does this (especially more than once) has their own routine they all have something. I'm trying to remember which famous NY author -- it may have been John Gardner, but I'm not sure -- who used to get dressed up in jacket and tie each morning, leave his apt., go down to a jury-rigged writing room in the basement, and take off his pants before sitting to his desk, thus ensuring it would be no simple thing to get up and go walkabout on his daily work.
As for DD -- hold up on the harsh, friend. Dealing with the shock of writing a first book is as much a part of the experience as is the surprising difficulty getting back in harness to start number five (my current predicament). I remember being asked what it was like to write when I was about a third of the way through my initial book. I told them it was wierd: I had to get up each morning, go sit in front of my computer, and ask myself "what do I think today?" You try it.
And @ Marek: scale is a bear. It's the whole deal, in fact. I'm trying to figure out right now if one of the two ideas I'm working on is really just a long narrative essay. I do wish there were a form that actually had an audience that ran 15-25K words, one quarter to one third the length of a modest book. Maybe Kindle and its successors will enable such a beast.
(I guess I'm asking here for the non-fiction version of a novella -- and that's a twisted form. I remember a riff Stephen King once wrote on the novella, in which it becomes a despotic "republic" into which writers disappear, never to emerge from its dank and twisted thickets. So perhaps this isn't such a wonderful idea.)
Top of the morning, all.
@8 - "You try it".
Dude, I've written 29 books.
Brian has written 0 books.
He can ride the horse hard,
or the the horse can ride him.
Now go get me a jelly donut. Now.
/bad cop.com/