Dear Song of the Desert (A Letter to My Novel)

Dear Song of the Desert, 

Hey-o.

Yesterday marked our one year anniversary. The beginning I drafted then was so different from how it is now. Goodness, the book itself is almost an entirely different story. 

The story took place in some sort of wasteland, and my mountain caves were forests. Your title was The Music Master. Half of the characters didn't exist, and my main character, Gita, didn't have her poor vision struggles. 

I wrote the last word on July 11th, 2015, taking a little longer than I normally do to write novels. You were my second novel... ever... to write, and you should feel pretty important because of that. 

We've gone through about five drafts together, now. Those early stages were hard to write. You were sometimes always a pain, but somehow we got through it. Now you're off to beta readers(*sniff* look at my baby -- all grown up), and I just have to wait in fear while they tear you apart.

This whole journey wasn't perfect, though. There were tears. There were lots of moments of frustration. I felt discouraged. I compared you to other novels.  I lost chapters due to computer problems. There were many times when I wanted to pitch you in the garbage and just g i v e  u p.  But you certainly taught me how to persevere through something tough, so thank you for that, I guess.

You were also troublesome -- I think everyone on this blog can testify to that from all my moaning about the struggles of editing. ;) And it wasn't only editing, it was writing, too. I got stuck in places. I thought the plot was going to be done when I was 23,000 words in. That gave me a scare. (until I got to 93,000 words. I'm really bad at estimating, okay?) You liked giving me ideas for new plot lines after I was halfway through editing a draft.

Also, typos. Typos and lines such as: THIS ALL STINKS UGHHH, were commonly found in my first couple drafts. 

I still have those moments and freak outs where I think, "Is this even good? The sequel's a mess. My characters are stupid. Everything's stupid." But it's become less. I'm finally starting to see good parts in you, as long as it may have taken.

Yes, you were a troublemaker, but you could've been worse. Editing could've taken so much longer. Seven months is a long time, and I hope to get faster at it with later books, but I managed to get it done. And in less than a year.

I get excited (and rather nervous) when I think about what's ahead of us. Comments from beta readers. Editing those comments from beta readers. And, in the future, we can start down the route of publishing. *screams* There's lots to come, but we'll get through it.

I want to end this before it gets too cheesy and I get all teary eyed, but thank you for being you, as tough as you may be sometime.

It's been an amazing journey, and I can't wait to continue on it with you. 

Love,
your author.

// post inspired by Aimee's letter to her WIP

What would you say in a letter to your novel? How long have you been working on your current WIP?

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