Hey, it’s Liz, and if you didn’t already know, I’m an author.
I love writing. It’s one of my favorite forms of creative expression, and I like to think I’m even good at it. When I was in sixth grade, I got random inspiration for my first novel, and I’ve been starting books based on random inspiration ever since. But I’ve officially hit a wall with a project.
During my freshman year, I was dealing with a crush on a friend of mine, and in order to sort some things out, I made a UA (universe alternate) version of our story. You may think I mean an AU (alternate universe) but you would be wrong. A UA is basically where everything is the same expect a key detail or two, which is enough to radically change the direction of the story. As it helped me sort out my feelings, it became something I really enjoyed writing. I got deeply involved with the story, and soon, I decided to put it out there for other people to read. This was Rosemary & Juliet, of course.
As that grew, I got a second burst of inspiration for a parallel story line in the same universe: The Genderfluid Club. This book had seven protagonists, all of whom identified as genderfluid, and they had a Club together. After Rose and Jules faked their death at the end of the book (like in Romeo and Juliet, but more efficiently), there was this whole murder investigation going down, all of which was touched on in this book instead.
Originally, I thought it would just end there, but then I got even more inspired. I had a brilliant idea for a trilogy on each side of the parallel plot, then one book at the end to bring it all together. From Rose and Jules’ perspective in Witness Protection to the seven growing their Club in Project Equality, I started thinking about their futures. It was like watching my children grow up and accomplish what they wanted to in their lives, you know?
Project Equality has been going wonderfully. I’m actually almost done writing it, though I still have over a month of uploads for it, and I think it’s the quickest I’ve ever written any book. It’s certainly on schedule to be finished before the end of August, which was the goal I set in the beginning of the year (which is absolutely insane, because I never meet deadlines that I set that far in advance). That’s not the problem area.
I cannot write Witness Protection. I don’t know why, I don’t know what my problem is, but every time I sit down to do it, I just can’t. You’d think that Rosemary and Juliet would be the easiest to write about because they were the two who started it all, but no, they’re more difficult. I’m not sure if it’s because their story line no longer serves its original purpose (helping me sort out my feelings) or if I just can’t handle calm, suburban life where my characters are meant to stay out of trouble, but I’m seriously struggling here.
I’ve only written five chapters of it since I started it in February, and they’re not even long or good chapters. This blog post might end up being longer than the average of those chapters, come to think of it. On the one hand, I feel like giving up. I can technically write the rest of the seven’s trilogy without going into detail about those two and still do just fine in the final book that ties it all together, and it wouldn’t really feel like anything was missing.
On the other hand, though, there are so many new characters that have the potential to make an impact on my audience. A reader of mine recently made me aware of the fact that my writing has helped some people on their path to self discovery, and I have a list of 20+ character who can continue to help me do that. That’s the whole thing that I love about writing, the whole reason I started posting my works out there, and I really don’t want to miss out on an opportunity.
Maybe I need to change my mindset about this whole thing. What began as a book to help myself figure things out has become a book series that’s been helping other people figure things out instead. That’s something I enjoy doing, it’s a story that I enjoy writing, and eventually, the inspiration will come. The source of my stress, of course, is that Witness Protection has the same general deadline as Project Equality, and I feel like I should be able to write them at the same relative speed. For whatever reason, though, I can’t.
It doesn’t help that when I go to play Sims 3 to take my mind off of things, my Sim is an author, and she writes like a book and a half every week (way to make me feel inadequate, Ce). I usually take three years just to write one. But, as I already said, I’m close to finishing Project Equality, which I started in February. Six months is record time for me, so I can’t be too hard on myself.
Anyways, both books should be updated tomorrow on Wattpad, so if any of this has caught your attention, maybe check it out? And I’ll see you Sunday for the next weekly outline.
awkwardfangirl 