Let's Talk About Writing

Let’s talk about writing.

Specifically, let’s talk about writing books.

In Leigh Bardugo’s Grishaverse novels, Grisha become stronger and healthier by using their power. If they try to hide their power, the strain manifests in physical debilitation—but all they have to do is use their power to bring a glow to their skin and a sparkle to their eye. Literally. Observe:

“Right,” I said, and snatched the mirror from her. But then I had to smile. The sad, sickly girl with hollowed-out cheeks and bony shoulders was gone. In her place was a Grisha with sparkling eyes and shimmering waves of bronze hair. ~ Shadow and Bone, Leigh Bardugo

This is how I feel about writing.

When I go for long periods of time without writing creatively, the strain of pent-up thought manifests in psychological debilitation—but all I have to do is jot a few words down, and my sense of well-being gets a restorative reset.

Leigh Bardugo’s description coincides with one of my favorite quotes about writing from one of my favorite books by one of my favorite writers:

“In the meanwhile she had got her mood on to paper—and this is the release that all writers, even the feeblest, seek for as men seek for love; and having found it, they doze off happily into dreams and trouble their hearts no further.” ~ Gaudy Night, Dorothy Sayers

I’ve been thinking about my relationship to writing lately, and it’s led me to implement some changes in my daily schedule and weekly goals. Let me ’splain:

On July 12, 2018, I finished the first draft of The Ancient.

On July 13, 2019, I finished the first draft of Brad Kendrick and the Land of Loss (hereafter referred to as “Brad #1”), the first in a planned five-book series. I was on a roll: a book a year seemed a pretty sweet pace to maintain.

But I didn’t maintain it.

July 14, 2020 rolled around, and I had written exactly one chapter in Brad #2. And the debilitation was starting to manifest . . . unpleasantly.

It wasn’t like I’d been idle; Himalayas, no. (Brad swears using geographical terms. He’s a fjording riot.) The year had been full of important things:

~ editing Brad #1
~ editing other people’s books (check out this, this, and this to get a sampling of my work!)
~ more editing Brad #1
~ getting feedback from my writers’ group and beta readers for Brad #1
~ MORE editing Brad #1
~ planning Brad #2 and the rest of the series
~ you guessed it: STILL more editing Brad #1
~ querying like a house on fire (40 agents as of last week!) to try to get an agent for Brad #1

There were other things, too. I started a new part-time job. Every day, there was food to prepare and dishes to do and things to clean and a doggie boy to care for. Then the world caught fire and fell apart—over and over and over, in different ways—so I wrestled through that with everyone else.

I was also learning all sorts of important adult things about where I find my worth and how not to fall apart at the end of the day when I feel like I just didn’t do enough. July 14, 2020 found me a much more emotionally mature and mentally stable Ruth than the previous year, thank Everest.

Still, I missed writing.

So I’m trying something new. Now that Brad #1 is DONE (as done as a book ever can be), I plan to resist the urge to tweak it into incoherence and move on to Brad #2 in earnest. All the other claims upon my time still exist, but a writer in a podcast I listened to recently (check out “The Stories Between Us”: Shawn Smucker and his wife Maile are wonderful) mentioned “20 minutes a day” as a conceivable goal.

I thought, “I can do 20 minutes.”

It may not be every day. Some days, it may be 30 minutes, or even—gasp!—45. But after a week of mostly success, I can feel the glow returning to my soul-skin. I feel my eyes starting to sparkle.

I also realized it doesn’t always have to be forging ahead on Brad #2. I’ve got a whole series taking shape in my brain, and I need to record moments from #3, #4, and #5 as they present themselves to me. This is the exciting time: the days I’ll look back on with poignant longing in years to come. I’m discovering Brad’s world, and it is a deeply transformative place to be.

I’ll leave you with this:

If you’ve spent much time on this blog, you know that music is of paramount importance to my writing process. Sometimes a song GETS INSIDE ME, and I listen to it over and over while scenes from a story play out—or take shape—in my imagination. This is especially true for Brad; he’s a musician, see, and music is the primary magical agent in this new fantasy world I’m chronicling.

Recently, I was listening to this song (O blessed Mumford! How thou knowest Brad. How thou knowest me)—and then, suddenly, I wasn’t listening. I was inside the song; at least, I wanted to be. The desire to become one with the music grew stronger and stronger—and there it was: the climactic scene of Brad #5 and the culmination of the music-magic so foundational to the series as a whole.