Thoughts on Completing my Second Novel
March 17, 2024
I stared at the title of the post for like five minutes trying to think of what to say.
Full disclosure, I finished the novel two weeks ago. On March 5, I wrote the speech in chapter 5 that I'd been putting off, and that marked the completion of Hand Magic. I tracked progress in my journal. Start to finish writing?
Three weeks.
It took me three weeks to write my second novel. It took me a year and a half to write my first. And I should add that I drafted this novel for around a month and half. So if we're being real, Hand Magic took two months to write.
Three weeks in the throes of creation. Not gonna lie, they were brutal, not because I struggled with the writing (I didn't), but because I literally didn't do anything else. I wrote every single day, except the two days my mother was in town and took my sister and me to Cape Cod. I survived on peanut butter toast and roasted potatoes from the Mexican grocery store down the street. Hours of sitting at my kitchen table took their toll, and tomorrow I am getting the first professional massage of my life because the neck discomfort is interfering with my sleep. My therapist says I need to do better, and she's right.
Now the good news! I wrote in my journal in the first week of February that I was feeling listless. Uninspired. Not depressed! But not wholly thrilled at life either. I'm happy to report that feeling is gone. Completely disappeared. I am...at peace? Dare I say it, happy? I'm interested in stuff again, looking forward to the future again, and life feels pretty cool.
Creating is weird like that. I felt the same way after finishing my previous longform writing project. I think the boulder metaphor is quite apt.
You know those kung fu training montages where the guy carries a giant boulder up the mountain? Creating is like that. You carry a giant boulder for an undetermined amount of time. You go up the mountain. The air thins as you go, so even though you're getting stronger, you don't really feel it. Then you get to the summit and you put the boulder down. You run back to the bottom of the mountain. And when you get there, you have a stronger body, magnificent aerobic fitness, oxygenated air to breathe, and no heavy boulder to carry.
That's why we create. Because it makes us better people. The strength, the fitness, the power that comes from making something amazing and seeing it through to the end is like nothing else on Earth. I feel profoundly better for having finished Hand Magic. And it wasn't a struggle. The novel was well within my wheelhouse, which was my whole reason for writing it. I wasn't expecting to feel anything, to be honest. It took me about a week to notice my mood had changed. It's nice. I'm glad for it. Even if this book never gets published, I'll be glad I wrote it.
No longer in the throes of creation and I already miss writing. In between prepping for Muse & Marketplace, entering pitch contests, and applying for grants, I am drafting the sequel to Hand Magic, tentatively titled Breath of War. I probably won't have time to actually write it until May, when the spring semester is over. But I am going to plan the living hell out of it.
Thanks for your support everybody!
xx Claire
