The journey begins ...
... or, to be more accurate, the next stage of the journey begins.
A publishing contract has been signed and so the first leg, writing the thing, is over. I now must treat it as though hewn from stone, rather than the waters of creativity. No more tweaking, time to move on. It's been with me so long that it might be hard to let go ... but let go I must!
So what are my hopes and fears for ‘Grosse Fugue’? Should I reveal my innermost thoughts? Perhaps not yet. As any author knows, the greatest hunger is for an audience, preferably one as large as possible. Of course, there's a revenue attraction to that. But for many, it's just the notion of our work being read by many hearts and minds.
A few may love it, many may loathe it. A handful might be moved, others offended. With any luck, no-one will be indifferent, the true mark of failure. But I hope that some may be tempted for the first time to delve into the music that permeates the novel - Bach, Beethoven, Schubert - and then perhaps relish the consolation, inspiration and transportation that I have sought to communicate. And if one or two are stimulated to think about the Holocaust, its meaning and legacy, then I might just begin to think that the journey was worthwhile.
There, the context is set. The purpose of this blog series is to share the experience of writing a novel and seeking a publisher, and to explain the process of getting the work out there in print and digitally. It will be a serial of excitement and frustration, bloody-mindedness and compromise, highs and lows, hopes and fears.
My next post will return to the very beginning.
Ian Phillips is a freelance writer for businesses whose first novel, Grosse Fugue, will be published by Alliance Publishing Press this Spring
Hi Ian.
I've been busy drafting so haven't spent much time on here the past week. However, I look forward to reading your posts and finding out how the whole process has worked for you.
Sarah :)
Hi Adrian, thanks for the questions. I will be dealing with much of this in future posts.
Yours is currently about 50% longer than mine. As I'll explain, I haven't really encountered the dreaded Block. My progress was sporadic principally because, as I'll explain in Week 3, I was writing for business clients during the day and I didn't find it conducive to progressing the novel.
I can't say specifically how many redrafts I did. It was a constant evolution, rather than a 'Done that - rest - pick it up again - start from scratch' kind of progress.
Hopefully, as the Blog series unwinds, you'll get some answers (and many more questions probably!).
Thanks for your interest.
Good Luck with your book Ian.
I would be interested to hear whether it was you, your agent, or publisher who decided your book was ready to be published. How did you arrive at that decision? Is a book ever ready? How many redrafts did you do? I ask because I am in the process of starting redraft number four of my first novel. I know there will be many more. I am finding the redrafting process fun. My novel is tighter and much improved, but there is still room for further improvement. Did you suffer from writers block at any stage. I never had that problem. I still have a 145,000 word count to reduce. How many words did you cut? Did you find the editing process fun?