I plan on publishing this site on my birthday (13th January, thanks for the gift card...) and I am a sucker for overthinking things, especially around key dates - Christmas, birthdays, New Year, days ending in Y...
This year, I've made a commitment to myself - and to everyone I hold dear, sorry, bad punctuation, everyone I hold, dear... - that I WILL finish the draft of my first novel by the end of January 2021.
I have to confess, and this is where the excuses start to come in, I would technically have finished my first draft about 10 years ago except for the following reasons, which you can, if you wish interpret as great advice for writers from one who has managed to spectacularly fail at writing for some time;
Writing Advice from a Frustrated Writer
Back Up Your Work: I can estimate that I had written up around 200pp of a novel about the Boer War, 130pp of a novel set in 1980s California, 75pp of a teenage fiction set in Roman Britain, among countless short stories, poems, research, and notes. When my laptop exploded (yes, they can do that), it was all vapour. That was, I think, around 2011 and I think it damaged me.
Never, Never, Ever Give Up: The mantra I have tried to instil at my football club is this. We have won, drawn, and lost games in the final minutes of matches. There will always be highs and lows but so long as you never give up, there's always a chance of success. I overlooked this in relation to my own ambitions.
Good Ideas Never Get Forgotten: Everything I've written or imagined is in my brain somewhere. The most powerful and interesting ideas are bursting to get out; the challenge is making time to give them a page to splash out on to. I didn't make the time as I assumed I could be a writer whenever I wanted. Well, I want it now so I better work hard at it now!
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