So who am I writing for? If I was honest I'd admit, it's mostly for me. If I was being fair I'd say, but also it's for you. Is that a boring answer? Maybe, but as I work on the prologue for the new book I realize I am being a better writer this time than I was when I wrote the prologue for the last book. I'm writing and reading and re-writing and reading and looking things up and re-writing and reading again and I'm getting someone else's take. I am doing the things you may already do all the time but I realized - and it shocked me - that I did not do this the last time around.
When I wrote the prologue for Witch I wrote it quickly, mostly as a way of getting past the fear that I couldn't write the book at all. I dashed it off - as if it was an exercise at a Monday night writing group. I got through it so I could begin the real work of writing the book. It was that mad dash across the sand before you throw yourself under the first ocean wave and begin to swim.
So, my apologies if the prologue to Witch seems a little drab. I am (either by nature or by a perversity of my own design) an autodidact. This is not something I necessarily recommend but neither do I wholeheartedly condemn it. There are pluses and minuses to both sides of that coin. What it meant here is that when I sat down to write my first novel at a fairly ancient age I did the thing I know how to do. I threw myself at the project with a will and hoped that my open eyes would make me better by and by.
Before I settled down at the machine this morning I spent some time in the garden with my friend, Paula. It was more fun this year because I finally hired someone who knows more than I do about plants and soil and light. I am re-thinking this autodidact thing in a serious way. Maybe I can get some of you to be beta readers for the new book. You can tell me what I need to fix.
When I wrote the prologue for Witch I wrote it quickly, mostly as a way of getting past the fear that I couldn't write the book at all. I dashed it off - as if it was an exercise at a Monday night writing group. I got through it so I could begin the real work of writing the book. It was that mad dash across the sand before you throw yourself under the first ocean wave and begin to swim.
So, my apologies if the prologue to Witch seems a little drab. I am (either by nature or by a perversity of my own design) an autodidact. This is not something I necessarily recommend but neither do I wholeheartedly condemn it. There are pluses and minuses to both sides of that coin. What it meant here is that when I sat down to write my first novel at a fairly ancient age I did the thing I know how to do. I threw myself at the project with a will and hoped that my open eyes would make me better by and by.
Before I settled down at the machine this morning I spent some time in the garden with my friend, Paula. It was more fun this year because I finally hired someone who knows more than I do about plants and soil and light. I am re-thinking this autodidact thing in a serious way. Maybe I can get some of you to be beta readers for the new book. You can tell me what I need to fix.