Love this post so, so much Courtney. Thank so for sharing these "actual" timelines -- so illuminating and grounding for all of us to understand and consider in how we frame and value our own work. Love it all, and love being a part of this community - it's wonderful! Thank you.
And - I can very much relate to this "fermenting" process in my own work. As you know, Courtney, I've been working hard on my first full novel manuscript for almost three years now. BUT - I actually started it in 2009. I wrote about a third of what became the first draft way back then. And then it sat almost untouched for about a decade. I got married, I started working alongside my husband for our small family business, and then I had two kids with whom I stayed home full time doing all the domestic things for years to come.
Keeping a personal blog during my early parenting years was invaluable for me - both as a tool for my own processing, and in keeping my writing sharp and afloat. I wrote more than 50 essays in those years that I'm really proud of, though none of them were ever widely published. And I started reading a lot more - more and more each year. Reading to enjoy, yes, but also reading as a writer, ever observant of what worked, what didn't, what moved me.
In January 2020, after taking some local writing courses in recent years through which I connected with the person who is now my beloved writing coach/cheerleader/writing accountability partner, I committed to resurrecting and finishing that seed of a novel I'd planted and begun 11 years earlier.
I finished the full first draft in 2020, then I wrote an almost entirely new second draft, which I just finished this summer. I never ever thought I would almost entirely re-write my book from first draft to second, but - chapter by chapter- I did. It was incredibly daunting, took me over a year, but I can firmly state it is a BETTER book because I did. Why? Because I'm older and wiser, because I'm a better writer at 39 than I was at 26. Because (similar to Courtney's experience) I now share the real-life experience of marriage and mothering with my protagonist, along with countless other life experiences along the way that help inform my writing and world-view.
The second draft of my manuscript is now in the hands of a developmental editor and I hope to start agent queries this winter. I have faith in the fermentation process, and look forward to seeing where it takes me next.
This is just what I needed to hear today and maybe always. There is a chapter of a book I wrote in 2006 that my mind keeps going back to but something always becomes a bigger priority. You reminded me that maybe it is just not the right time and it will come, at some point. THANKS!
Thank you for this! I love your weekly roses of reality. Meant “doses” but maybe they’re both. Just picked up story I started ten years ago but couldn’t figure out. Diamond crayon, diamond crayon.
I am grateful for all the ways you encourage writers with honesty about your process. I just finished "Want" -- great recommendation! Thank you for this newsletter. Always providing condensed, valuable content I will stop to read, because it's important. Happy Thanksgiving. Thankful for your beautiful, benevolent spirit and your writing!
This was deeply heartening to read, Courtney. Thank you! I wrote a 80,000-word memoir during 2020 that ended up not being "the one" at all. Now, I'm working on another that feels closer...but in my most honest moments still feels not quite there. That unpublished memoir helped me to process and heal more things than I imagined possible. It was my version of therapy, and I got a bit better at writing in the process. Now, I try to have faith that whatever this new book is or is not, it's still worth every word.
Thanks for the naked truth. I'm crafting a novel from a short story I wrote in 2006 called "The Nanotube Toothbrush." I've embarrassed myself thinking it was finished about seven times. Now I see how it could take another year. And, of course, it's a wildly different story than I began with those many years ago. Sometimes I wonder if it's worth finishing. Your post has opened my mind.
Love this. All writers need less pressure to rapid release.
My completed and previously agented, but unsold, memoir is in a box in the hallway closet.
My current novel I’m editing began it’s life as a short story inspired by my flight attendant friend’s habit of masturbating in float tanks, and now it’s a Christmas dystopian book about endless snow and weather attacks.
This resonated so much for me. All of my books EXCEPT ONE have been years and years and dozens of drafts. The itchy part was that my first book came to me quickly, sold quickly, so I thought I'd made it, and that was the process. It took a while for me to realize that was a delightful lucky fluke, and the years of work on the other books is, in fact, the way it's supposed to go.
I really appreciated this perspective! I’m wondering if you ever considered self publishing along the way for projects that you had sent out and felt that they were complete but weren’t finding a home? That may not have been the case for you but that’s almost where I’m at with one of them, so am curious.
I love this reminder that our creative work is never really lost. It’s just fermenting, as you say. Another writer friend referred to an un-sold novel once as being “in inventory” and that’s how I now like to think about one or two of mine. I also think it’s wise to sometimes push back against the cultural impulse to speed. Nothing against NaNoWriMo, but I have been trying lately to write deliberately -small- amounts at a time. It’s ok to go slow. For me, at least.
It is difficult to figure out how to move to a paid subscription. What am I missing?
Also, I'm trying an experiment you might be interested in. I'm "publishing" the first chapter of my book, "Sex, Drugs, and Bipolar," adding one sentence at a time each day (https://substack.com/jesseliberty).
I will write to your Friday Office Hours to see if you think I can improve my query letter, which I've been polishing for longer than I care to admit.
Love this post so, so much Courtney. Thank so for sharing these "actual" timelines -- so illuminating and grounding for all of us to understand and consider in how we frame and value our own work. Love it all, and love being a part of this community - it's wonderful! Thank you.
And - I can very much relate to this "fermenting" process in my own work. As you know, Courtney, I've been working hard on my first full novel manuscript for almost three years now. BUT - I actually started it in 2009. I wrote about a third of what became the first draft way back then. And then it sat almost untouched for about a decade. I got married, I started working alongside my husband for our small family business, and then I had two kids with whom I stayed home full time doing all the domestic things for years to come.
Keeping a personal blog during my early parenting years was invaluable for me - both as a tool for my own processing, and in keeping my writing sharp and afloat. I wrote more than 50 essays in those years that I'm really proud of, though none of them were ever widely published. And I started reading a lot more - more and more each year. Reading to enjoy, yes, but also reading as a writer, ever observant of what worked, what didn't, what moved me.
In January 2020, after taking some local writing courses in recent years through which I connected with the person who is now my beloved writing coach/cheerleader/writing accountability partner, I committed to resurrecting and finishing that seed of a novel I'd planted and begun 11 years earlier.
I finished the full first draft in 2020, then I wrote an almost entirely new second draft, which I just finished this summer. I never ever thought I would almost entirely re-write my book from first draft to second, but - chapter by chapter- I did. It was incredibly daunting, took me over a year, but I can firmly state it is a BETTER book because I did. Why? Because I'm older and wiser, because I'm a better writer at 39 than I was at 26. Because (similar to Courtney's experience) I now share the real-life experience of marriage and mothering with my protagonist, along with countless other life experiences along the way that help inform my writing and world-view.
The second draft of my manuscript is now in the hands of a developmental editor and I hope to start agent queries this winter. I have faith in the fermentation process, and look forward to seeing where it takes me next.
This is just what I needed to hear today and maybe always. There is a chapter of a book I wrote in 2006 that my mind keeps going back to but something always becomes a bigger priority. You reminded me that maybe it is just not the right time and it will come, at some point. THANKS!
Thank you for this! I love your weekly roses of reality. Meant “doses” but maybe they’re both. Just picked up story I started ten years ago but couldn’t figure out. Diamond crayon, diamond crayon.
I am grateful for all the ways you encourage writers with honesty about your process. I just finished "Want" -- great recommendation! Thank you for this newsletter. Always providing condensed, valuable content I will stop to read, because it's important. Happy Thanksgiving. Thankful for your beautiful, benevolent spirit and your writing!
This was deeply heartening to read, Courtney. Thank you! I wrote a 80,000-word memoir during 2020 that ended up not being "the one" at all. Now, I'm working on another that feels closer...but in my most honest moments still feels not quite there. That unpublished memoir helped me to process and heal more things than I imagined possible. It was my version of therapy, and I got a bit better at writing in the process. Now, I try to have faith that whatever this new book is or is not, it's still worth every word.
Thanks for the naked truth. I'm crafting a novel from a short story I wrote in 2006 called "The Nanotube Toothbrush." I've embarrassed myself thinking it was finished about seven times. Now I see how it could take another year. And, of course, it's a wildly different story than I began with those many years ago. Sometimes I wonder if it's worth finishing. Your post has opened my mind.
Love this. All writers need less pressure to rapid release.
My completed and previously agented, but unsold, memoir is in a box in the hallway closet.
My current novel I’m editing began it’s life as a short story inspired by my flight attendant friend’s habit of masturbating in float tanks, and now it’s a Christmas dystopian book about endless snow and weather attacks.
This resonated so much for me. All of my books EXCEPT ONE have been years and years and dozens of drafts. The itchy part was that my first book came to me quickly, sold quickly, so I thought I'd made it, and that was the process. It took a while for me to realize that was a delightful lucky fluke, and the years of work on the other books is, in fact, the way it's supposed to go.
I really appreciated this perspective! I’m wondering if you ever considered self publishing along the way for projects that you had sent out and felt that they were complete but weren’t finding a home? That may not have been the case for you but that’s almost where I’m at with one of them, so am curious.
Ok, that Buzzfeed article made me lol.
I love this reminder that our creative work is never really lost. It’s just fermenting, as you say. Another writer friend referred to an un-sold novel once as being “in inventory” and that’s how I now like to think about one or two of mine. I also think it’s wise to sometimes push back against the cultural impulse to speed. Nothing against NaNoWriMo, but I have been trying lately to write deliberately -small- amounts at a time. It’s ok to go slow. For me, at least.
It is difficult to figure out how to move to a paid subscription. What am I missing?
Also, I'm trying an experiment you might be interested in. I'm "publishing" the first chapter of my book, "Sex, Drugs, and Bipolar," adding one sentence at a time each day (https://substack.com/jesseliberty).
I will write to your Friday Office Hours to see if you think I can improve my query letter, which I've been polishing for longer than I care to admit.
Thank you again,
Jesse Liberty