Novel Experiment Day 6 – What Was I Thinking?

My hands and wrists hurt. I don’t give a shit what happens to the couple in Wallbanger. I pretty much hate this book I’m writing, too. Having no real foundation in the romance tropes and traditions I don’t have a real voice. I’m trying to write like this or like that instead of sticking to my own style.

Right now I feel like Bruce Willis in Die Hard.

I thought this would be fun. An interesting way to spend two weeks so that I didn’t mess around with Summer Wind before I can read it with a fresh pair of eyes and figure out how to get it in shape for the hand-off to my editor.

But this is like a punishment! I’m reading books I’m not interested in while books I genuinely want to read sit on my Kindle taunting me. Why am I punishing myself? Do I feel like I haven’t worked hard enough? That I haven’t earned a break? So far in 2014 I did final rounds of rewrites and published Griefed, wrote and published B.Y.O.P., and wrote a first draft of Summer Wind. If you don’t count Griefed as ‘writing’ since I finished the first draft December 30, 2013, I’ve still written over 120,000 words this year.

Day Six may just be an off-day. (And I did get a little over 1,200 words written which would be completely satisfying daily total if I was writing one of my “real books.”) One in which I feel sorry for myself and just really need some time away from the keyboard. But on the other hand I keep going back to the reason why I have never before attempted the romance genre: I just don’t like it. And writing something you wouldn’t want to read seems like a pretty lame thing to do.

So. Do I forge ahead and push myself to finish a first draft in the next 8 business days? Do I take a more leisurely route and admit that two weeks is not enough time? Do I say “fuck it,” shelve the project, and dive into writing Lexy #4, or even just throw up my hands and take a break from writing for another week. Read books I want to read, watch movies, take my kid swimming and otherwise refill the creativity bank?

I’m going to sleep on it. And see how I feel tomorrow.