Struggling

Not feeling great. Unfortunately I've come to a quite serious halt in my novel. After years of writing personal stories, hundreds of pages worth of various projects, I started a novel which I had all intention of publishing and which meant a lot to me. That latter point is an understatement. I've written around 65k words so far and while the project had problems, they were all easy to fix or at least not so serious as to ruin everything. But in the past few days I've been dwelling on problems which exist on a foundational level. One of them was about what certain characters would do at the end of the story. Then I started to think about more of the story and quickly there was a compounding effect whereby things quickly got out of control. To be blunt, I'm quite distressed. This project is what has been keeping me going. I seem to have written all of this without realising certain crucial issues with how the story works. The problem is that my story is very "meta" and the world in which the characters exist is fluid and dynamic. The "metaphysics" of the thing don't quite work. Everything is muddled. What I once thought was fine suddenly isn't. I have a list of problems that just keep growing and I have half written sentences which are supposed to be solutions. I think I need to take a deep breath and stay away from it for a while, but I know I'm going to have to spend months rewriting it. I shouldn't have put so much effort into such untraditional narrative. I don't know what I'm asking for here other than sympathy--which won't help anything.

 

I think anyone who has tried writing will relate. Personally, I'm piss poor as self critic. Yesterday I was happy with some of my finished short stories. Today, I will think they're total shite and who knows what tomorrow will bring? Thing to do? Remember it's not punishment but something I actually enjoy doing, chill and maybe look for someone else to cast an eye over some of the problematic pieces. Taking a break is ok too. Best of luck.

 

I've been (still are) on the fourth iteration of my story, which means it's the fourth complete rewrite, because I encountered the same dissatisfaction you did. Everytime I resolved to do something about them, because the new start would make my story better. It did, and it does. Just take a deep breath and think sideways of how you can solve your story's difficulty. You can do anything. You are allowed to do anything!

I also have written my ending and as @Selbbin , it helps. If you know where you want the story to end and you know the start, then the rest is enjoying the roadside. Who cares if you take a few more hours to get there?

 

Thanks, everyone. I appreciate your responses a lot. I will take a break. When I come back to it I'm going to see how much I can salvage and what is good and workable about the story. What I don't understand is how I got this far (65k is relatively short, but I was on the second last chapter) without realising any of this. Is there such a thing as writer's blindness on such a broad level? It worries me. Almost as if my brain has betrayed me. But I'm not exactly new to writing.

The core of my story is still there and I will be able to save many thousands of words of it, but unfortunately all that I'm dissatisfied with runs throughout the story. My story is a portal fantasy where the 'secondary world' is linked to characters' thoughts and feelings, where the world shifts and alters, and certain 'powers' can be harnessed in times of strife based on real world interferences. I can't give examples since that would take a lot of context, but suffice it to say it's not a standard adventure in a secondary world. I don't understand how I've only just realised the issues intrinsic to it. My theory is that I focused so much on each individual section to the detriment of the overall structure. But I did plan it and I always thought about the overarching themes and conflict. It's just that the 'magic' aspect and they way certain characters grow and develop don't make much sense in light of where I've taken the story.

Okay. I'm going to take a break. I just need to remember that people have similar problems. I'm just naturally pessimistic and it's hard not to think I've just wasted half a year of my life (I'm a fairly slow writer for various reasons) and that I'm nowhere near finished this first draft. I had planned to enter a refinement stage at the end of February.

 

I said I would take a break, but I spent almost the entire day trying to fix issues, even rewriting the outline in different versions. I don't dislike the meaning of the story and what it stands for, but the tone, setting and the narrative layout are not to my liking anymore. I'm not even sure why I wrote parts of it. How that can be, I don't know. I'm frankly terrified this is going to turn into another abandoned project. But this would be quite a bit bigger than other abandoned projects and I wouldn't get the benefits from my friends reading it because it's incomplete and riddled with issues. There's this psychological problem I have right now where I want to abandon this project and to settle on a new idea which I've had for a while as well. I would be turning to that not just because I would instantly be relieved of the stress of fixing and rewriting for weeks or months, but also because this other idea is much more appealing. It's like a stark, appealing rejection of the issues and complications in favour of newness and intrigue and difference. Even when I was changing parts of my novel and struggling through different versions, I was writing ideas for other projects that came to my head. That isn't healthy. At least I know it's all flight and distraction.

Yet I keep thinking about it. I feel like I'm not allowed to think about quitting this. A voice is telling me that I have to stick with this and struggle through it, even though my head already isn't in a good place. I can't believe I'm even thinking this.

 

Based on your last post, if I were you I would try to reframe your thinking. You're allowed to do whatever you want, it's your work and your life. However, bear in mind that almost every creative project of any scope will come to a stage where you've put enough of it physically in the world that you can begin to see the full scale of the flaws in your original idea. That may sound scary and hopeless, but it's really the best part of the whole thing. Almost no one has a flawless novel in their head, ready to transfer to paper without a single change. Rather, this is a natural point where you start really getting to grips with it and tackling those blocks which are stopping your work from being the best it can be. (Some people like to think of this phase as a nurturing one. I find it more accurate and satisfying to imagine myself beating the project into shape with a steel pipe, like some kind of modernist sculpture.)

For myself, the project I've just sent off for betaing has maybe five scenes which were present in my original conception, and of those only the final one have any of the original substance, the others are just form (e.g. these characters are at this location at this time). And that's a good thing, because it turns out those other scenes as I originally wrote them were just placeholders, helping me to frame the idea as a whole. Once I got a better hold on it, I no longer needed my scaffolding.

Finally, try to remember that your two options are not 'do everything right now' or 'abandon it completely'. If your other project is calling to you, go work on that for a bit, but don't tell yourself this one is dead unless it truly is. Just leave it alone for a bit. Think of it as an overwrought toddler (or puppy, or pony, or whatever you like) that just needs some quiet time to calm down without you fretting over it and winding both of you up further. You're not abandonning it, just focussing on something else for a little while. You might find, as I do, that once you've been working on your new project for a few days or a week or two, your present project will start clamouring for your attention again, and some of the knots which seem overwhelming now you will actually be excited to get your hands on and start solving.

 

Thank you so much for this. So, I've decided that I'm not going to abandon it. I've already put too much into it. I don't think I have the mental fortitude not to take a break, so I'm still continuing to work through it. Even now I've written 7 pages of various different options and solutions, including major outline changes, and it is helpful. I think I was just distressed at how I seem to have not noticed very serious issues with my narrative. As you say, this is sometimes natural and there are many reasons why that might happen. Thanks again. I'll refer back to this often, I think.

 

Now might be a good time to sit down, take a day, make a chapter by chapter outline of the remaining chapters, figure out the ending, and come up with a comprehensive storyline that makes sense. Then, being methodical, execute your plan.

 

I would amend that, because the process doesn't happen in one day. You start by clearly formulating the questions and pondering deeply on them. The most important part of getting a good answer is to properly formulate the question. Then let it simmer on a back burner. Sometimes an answer might rise up from your unconscious the next day (sleeping on it is more than just a saying, it allows the unconscious to work on a problem), or it might take days or weeks for answers to begin to form. And they won't necessarily appear complete, they might form gradually by stages. It's vitally important while letting the mind cogitate on a problem to work on something else. Divert your attention. If you keep the conscious mind focused on the issue, the unconscious isn't free to work its magic.

This is a well-known process used by thinkers and problem solvers throughout history and is backed by a lot of research. The mind is a powerful question/answer machine, but it's important to let the unconscious play its part.

 

I don't disagree with this as a plan to finish a book, but from what OP has written here and elsewhere it sounds more like they need some time away and then a structural rethink of the whole project. No point trying to put the roof on till you've fixed the foundations, after all.

 

I am trying to take breaks, little ones, but I'm one of those people who just can't be happy unless I've sorted something. I once handed in a dissertation of about 20 pages bound in a folder despite the fact that most people hadn't started theirs yet. Just the way I am, I suppose. Anyway, I do think it's genuinely helpful constantly to ask questions. Before I started the first draft I wrote perhaps three pages worth of single questions and answered all of them. I still managed run into all these problems, but it did help. Writing is certainly an odd thing. A lot of time just staring at a screen trying to come up with solution to an imaginary problem, to bind and constrict and shape the logic behind everything. It always feels like there's an answer to a particular problem lurking within the depths of the mind and you just need to wait a while until it arises.

Edit: I've managed to save more than half of what I originally wrote. I will need to edit, alter and develop much of the start up to the half way point, and the last quarter or so is to be almost wholly rewritten, but I'll take that over abandoning it.

 

Love this ^

 

The way I write has this sort of thing, where I see more, and more things will happen in the story. It never naturally becomes one story, and in my case I write like how I read what I really like, not wanting to think that the story I like with its characters comes to an ending. So I have various loose threads that will need to be tied up, while I keep writing adding yet more that my creativity brings up. And the real work in it is tying those loose threads up. After I go much further with writing than I would have thought I would with ideas I first had, I have worked at tying those up with regretting the thought it will come to an end, which it must, for my having any opportunity for the work I wrote to get published.