Writing Advice: Perpetual First Novel Syndrome
Writing my first novel took five and a half years and three attempts. It was a great learning experience, one I am proud of, but it also taught me I needed to write better fiction and take less time doing it.
During those five and a half years, I had what I’m going to call “Perpetual First Novel Syndrome”: I was captivated by this idea that I was going to make it big with this project, and I simply had to stick with it no matter what.
As I’ve discussed in my previous two posts, this attitude ultimately helped me to complete a draft, which is a very good and important thing.
However, I’ve also decided to never again spend five and a half years creating something that rough. Today I want to talk about my experience, what I learned, and how I overcame Perpetual First Novel Syndrome.
My Perpetual First Novel
For five and a half years and through three drafts, only one of which I actually completed, I was That Writer Guy, the one with the first novel in the works “and it’s going to be a best seller!” I couldn’t shut up about my novel.
So, why am I calling it my perpetual first novel? Five and a half years isn’t so bad; Pat Rothfuss has admitted it took him 15 years with The Name of the Wind.
I’m calling it that because for five and a half years, I was stuck on the idea that this beginner’s effort would be something great, and that I needed to stick with it and use it to launch my career as a novelist.
Now, there’s a time and a place for that: obviously, some projects are worth seeing through. Not every first novel is a Perpetual First Novel.
In this case, though, there were core aspects of my project that were very rough, fundamental problems with the story that bogged me down. I wrote myself into corners in the first two drafts, and the reason the third draft — the only complete one — took two and a half or so years is precisely that it was poorly conceived.
In other words, it was a Perpetual First Novel because I was stuck on the idea that it had to be my first published novel, and that idea blinded me to an understanding of why it shouldn’t be.
The Importance of Clearing My Head
After I completed the novel, I knew I needed to take some time off before tackling the fourth draft.
I already had plenty of ideas for that fourth draft, and before long I had more ideas. I could have very easily taken time off for a couple of months, and then dived back in.
Instead, I decided to try my hand at some short fiction. I knew precious little about writing short fiction, so I took it upon myself to read some short science fiction and fantasy stories.
One of my more important discoveries was Karen Russell’s short story collection Vampires in the Lemon Grove. Amazon informs me that I purchased it on August 15, 2018, a mere four days after I completed my novel.
Reading Karen Russell was a bit like being born again: the stories were so wonderfully different from the project that had consumed me for so long, and pointed me toward new ways of telling stories.
Clearing my head helped me to really see how much I had to gain by tackling some shorter fiction projects, the incredible wonders that I could not have guessed at if I had remained with my novel.
What I Gained
I’ve now completed eight short stories since finishing that rough draft of my novel last year. Some of those stories will never see the light of day, but I’m proud of at least a few of them, and very proud at how far I’ve come.
My novel was essentially sword and sorcery, but with barbarian horse-archers and living gods. My protagonist favored direct means of handling his problems.
In my short stories, I wanted to challenge myself by creating protagonists who wouldn’t always be able to solve things in that way.
I started thinking about ways to take fantastical elements — magic, divine manifestations, etc. — and use them to create problems and puzzles for my characters to solve. Don’t get me wrong, I still use action in my stories, but it’s fun to experiment with different challenges.
I’ve also had a lot of fun experimenting with different settings. The main setting I’m working in right now is a fantasy space opera setting, an interplanetary techno-magical civilization involving humans — three different species of humans, at that — and a variety of other sentient races.
This particular setting is one that I created based on some ideas I’ve had rolling around in my brain for a long time. I couldn’t develop it much during the time I was working on my novel, but now that I’m free of that, I can explore this new setting and write wonders I could hardly have dreamed of a year ago.
My most recent complete draft as of this writing is a futuristic fantasy, set in a version of our world after industrial civilization has been replaced with dream-magic.
It’s a world of gods and goddesses, angels, nightmare monsters, and an immortal oracle who will tell your future, provided you agree to allow her to eat you if the future she sees is worse than that (hey, there’s a reason she’s called the Merciful Oracle).
That particular story is one I came up with and wrote in about the span of two weeks, counting the brainstorming and note-taking. The actual writing of the story took only nine days, and it’s almost 12,800 words, or 22 pages single-spaced.
Choosing to Grow as a Writer
There’s a time and a place for sticking with your first novel and completing it, absolutely no matter what. However, there’s also a time and a place for realizing that you need to unchain yourself from a project so that you can try other things and grow as a writer.
I can’t give you one set of hard and fast rules that will tell you when to go with Option A, and when to choose Option B instead. Your situation with your first novel will inevitably be different from mine.
However, if you’ve spent a lot of time on it and you are still having a lot of trouble coming up with a complete draft that works for you, allow me to gently suggest that you may find it worthwhile to at least take a break.
Who knows what you could achieve by clearing your head, reading out of your usual comfort zone, and perhaps trying something new and different with your writing?
Maybe we can encapsulate this in the idea Choose what will help you grow as a writer.
For my part, I’m thrilled to have discovered wondrous new worlds, and the amazing characters who inhabit them.
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