This wasn't always the case. But the only time I tell people I write is when I have spent a significant amount of time actually writing. Telling people I write when I haven't written anything in a month or so makes me feel like I'm wearing a blond wig and lying to a contract killer to get in bed with him and thwart his assassination attempt.
I try not to talk about it at all because, believe it or not, my muse leaves when I talk about it. I don't get that, but if I tell someone I'm writing, you can be sure I won't touch pen to paper for over a week.
Haha well i work long hours anyway (I am a lawyer) so like tonight i worked 8-10.15 catching up, have had a cup of tea now and will write to midnight if not too tired - wife thinks i am still working!
Thanks for so many interesting replies - to be honest i think youve persuaded me to keep quiet until i have the first draft finished - i would hazzard a guess at about 120-130,000 words. Telling people now achieves nothing except 1 potentially putting pressure on me to finish sooner rather than later 2 could lead to argument over the time spent -best present something "complete" - albeit a rough draft I figure whilst at the moment i find time to write 10-15 mins before work, same at lunch, occasionally whilst we have tv on (she thinks i am on twitter!) and late at night when it comes to editing i will need some clear blocks of time to do it to make sure all the loopholes are closed. No way would my wife be interested - it is sci fi i am writing and it is scary how many modern (dare i say Trump) themes keep appearing. I think my parents would be amazed, they knew i loved writing when a kid (when in english we had to write a story my peers would write 2-3 pages i would come back with an 18 page epic!) so i imagine they'd be interested at least.
Yay for Trumpesque sci-fi! Also, if you have kids or grandkids, or great great grandkids, won't it be cool that you have left a piece of who you were behind, so they can connect, perhaps with an ancient relative from 2217
Especially if it's prescient. I regret not publishing a story I wrote in 1995, as it would clearly have been a big seller this year.
Yeah, IDK how you hide something like that from your spouse... Let the kitten deliver your cover story.
Haha yes my wife probably thinks I stay up watching porn , wonder how she'll react when I tell her?! Re the Trump thing I think the theme is more along the lines of no matter how much tech develops people still keep treating other people badly !
Do you know what , that is a fantastic thought. I just want to complete it, be proud of it and then publish it (99% sure self published).
Well still nobody knows. My son (he's 10) came and disturbed me late one night when he felt poorly and I had Scrivener open (as alluded to elsewhere it could have been worse it could have been porn, that's another story!) and he looked at the text and asked if I was working!
Can you just open up and tell them that you're 'working on a writing project that you can't discuss yet,' but that you'll tell them all about it when it's finished? It is hard to hide writing activity from curious family who actually live with you. Perhaps your efforts to be furtive are making them worry, and making them imagine all sorts of stuff. Just tell them you're writing, and ask them not to pester you about it? That they'll find out about it in due course? That's basically what I told my husband, and he was fine with that.
My fear is i will get an unsupportive reaction 'why are you wasting time on this hobby when we have house paperwork and chores to do?' (She'd have a point!)
Ah, the joys of being old and retired (semi, anyway). I tell people I'm writing any old time. If they say, "You're wasting your time with this stupid hobby!" I just say, "Blow it out your ass. I'll do whatever I want whenever I want to do it."
If you're writing whilst she's watching TV, I'm not sure she can then turn around and accuse you of wasting time...
If my partner was writing something, I'd honestly appreciate that they're doing something that they not only enjoy, but betters them as a person. It would be very much preferable to them faffing about on social media all day.
Just the opposite here... I was in a long-distance relationship in the pre-Internet days. I told her that if she wanted to see a picture of me then go to the book store and look at the inside cover of (title). My normal work is on the computer, and none of my family have any understanding of what it is I do, anyway. I have shown my science fiction to my wife, but she didn't understand it or show any interest. I wonder why you worry about “spilling the beans”? Why is a secret? Your IRL friends and family might know that you do some kind of writing for fun but be left out of exactly what it is you are writing. Like Veleda’s case, they can just accept that they would not find it interesting (true enough!) or understandable.
Why in the world would I tell anyone about my writing? The whole point is to escape from other people.
Only a few people know I'm writing, and even fewer really care about it, so I don't have that kind of problem.
My wife always knows that I'm writing...something. I tell her what it is only when it takes form and I can summarize it in two or three sentences. Beyond that, I have one writing friend, someone I met here, who usually knows once I have a project nearing completion (she is my most reliable beta-reader). Beyond that, I tell few, if any, people what I'm working on. If I'm 100% honest, that's because I never - never! - want to appear as if I have failed.
So, now you know you are not alone. Tell who you want to tell, when you want to tell them. And good luck with your writing.
I have about thirty books published and until this year there were only two people in my 'real world' life who knew I wrote. That number has recently expanded to four. Writing's a pretty solitary hobby. You don't need to talk about it if you don't want to.
