Hitting a Wall

Writing a book is hard! When I get overwhelmed, confused or hit a wall, I save a draft as a PDF and send it to a friend or two for feedback. Since the PDF created in late August (the seventh since July), I've hit a wall.

Being stuck was bad enough. Hating what I'd written so far was worse. I wanted to trash months of writing and start all over again.

I'm grateful for everyone who took the time to plow through the draft. The last version was 164 pages. Just reading something that long was high praise. The encouragement and support of those readers and others helps me to keep believing in myself when I feel like giving up.

The feedback has been very consistent. The comments for every draft revolve around whether I was writing a family history or something else, and about the need to really think about my audience. I understood, but couldn't figure out how to address the problems. Hence, the wall.

The wall came tumbling down thanks to the feedback Larry provided and to Terri's help thinking through the questions he raised. Granted, they both had an advantage because they knew about the problems and my inability to fix them. I still think Aunt Toodles somehow had something to do with it.

Now I'm devoting every spare minute to finishing the book. With Larry's questions answered in my head, the revisions came fast and easy. Once the problems were addressed, moving forward was easy, too.

The eight draft probably won't be the last. But it will likely be the first to make it to the end of the story. I hope to have it ready to share with a friend or two to read over the Thanksgiving holiday. I'll keep you posted, here on...

The Crotchety Old Man