A Progress Report on Writing

I am of the firm belief you do not ask someone when they are due unless you can see the baby crowning. Likewise, you don’t ask a writer how the novel is going.

We don’t know.

Besides, we’re not supposed to talk about it. We’re supposed to keep our big mouths shut and let the work speak for itself. Ideally after we’ve emerged from a volcano with a manuscript, multiple offers from agents, and severely chapped lips.

But here I am talking about it because apparently I’ve reached the part of writing a novel where I start peeling my skin off like a baked potato and handing it to the internet. Please acknowledge this. It’s covered in salt.

This is my third attempt at writing this novel. Not a third draft. I mean I’ve started over from scratch twice.

The first attempt took years to not finish. Entire children were conceived, born, and sent to preschool in less time. It was an accomplishment in the way that keeping your maternity underwear long after your youngest is complaining about their orthodontia is an accomplishment.

The second attempt was a rebound. A creative fling with all the structure of a failed soufflé and the range of a doorbell chime.

What pushed me into this third attempt was that the first two were steeped in political satire born of deeply unfunny, relentless real-life headlines. The world refused to cooperate. After a while, it felt like writing from inside a sealed flaming trash compactor. I do not enjoy such things.

Around that time, people who actually read books started asking for recommendations with an almost universal plea: “Something fun. Something smart. Something I can get lost in.”

And I thought, YES, SAME, PLEASE, and also, Hey, maybe I can build that place.

I already tell people to get lost all the time. Maybe I should help them do it.

So I started again and quickly finished a draft. It has legs. Newborn giraffe legs, but legs nonetheless.

“Great! So you’ve written a book!”

Oooh, no. I’ve written a draft. This is different from writing a book. A draft is a long, disorganized document that’s too done to be a total mess, and too messy to be anything else.

You know how people refer to airports as “liminal spaces”? My draft is an airport Chili’s.

There’s always revision, though.

People love to talk about revision. They use words like “refinement,” “clarity,” and “where the magic happens.”

Huh.

My revision process, such as it is, involves rereading what I’ve written and muttering, “What is this?” and “Who did this to me?” Plotlines open politely, never to return. Characters introduce themselves, say something baffling, then wander off towards Act Three. Entire pages seem to have been written while I was concussed.

Still, I persist…mostly because I’ve told too many people that I’m writing a book and now I’m trapped. There’s no going back. I either have to finish it or fake my death.

Writing a novel is mostly problem-solving, which is to say, it’s discovering that you are the problem. You move scenes around like furniture in a rental apartment. You convince yourself that having a refrigerator in the bathroom is fine, ignore it. Then you reread it and have to lie down.

I am told by people with better outlooks that this is all part of the process.

“It’s good to question your choices. Writing is about discovery!”

Maybe so. But when they say “discovery,” they mean it like spiritual growth. I mean it like accidentally finding a family of bonobos in the linen closet.

This is not my process. Those people are untrustworthy.

“Oh yeah, Smartmouth? What’s your process?”

Excuse me. Do you also ask a person tripping down stairs what their choreography is?

I mean: I sit. I write. Quietly. Irritably. Daily, if possible.

There will be a book. Sooner rather than later.

It’ll be as smart and as fun as I can make it. Something people can get lost in.

And one day, I’ll admit I’m enjoying the whole rotten process.

Until then, if you ask how it’s going, the answer is “Fine.”

Because I don’t want to talk about it.