Three novels written and now I’m at that beautifully naive stage; the very beginning. Anything is possible.
I was last here about 3 years ago – Novel 3 is Go, Go Go! – so it’s been a while but the feeling overwhelming me the most is not the dread of the blank page but not having anything to work on at the moment.
I’ve titled this post with ‘Project’ rather than ‘Novel’ because 2 of my 3 ideas are not novels. A part of me is tempted to go elsewhere, stretch my legs and test myself with something different.
Plus I’m not exactly showering myself with success writing novels so far.
I have the experience of finishing 3 novels so cold, hard determination to get to the end doesn’t faze me. The day-to-day grind of sitting down to write, wrangling plot holes, giving life to cartoonishly and crudely drawn characters, is something I enjoy. I actually love facing a blank page and turning it into a story.
With this knowledge and experience comes confidence meaning I feel empowered to step into a new arena and challenge myself with something I’ve never done before. A new novel in itself is enough of a challenge so maybe a better way to look at it is; I fancy a bit of a change.
So my 3 choices are;
- Contemporary Novel – I’ve got an idea of a man and woman meeting through one committing a (non-violent) criminal act against the other. Odds = 50%
- Football Film – I fancy writing a football film script, mainly for the reason that, can you name a decent football film? If you can name a fictional film with at least passable (pun intended) passages of play, let me know. Odds = 65%
- Interactive eBook/App – I’ve written some novels, I’ve produced an ebook and I used to be a web developer so it only seems natural to try and create some kind of interactive story. I’ve got a few ideas and I’m currently reading ‘Her Story‘ and I’ve got ‘Black Bar‘ lined up to go next. Odds = 80%
I’ve got my pre-project rituals all set up. There’s only two. A new A4 notebook and a new playlist of deep house tracks collected over the past year. Now to spend some time thinking, making notes and exploring these 3 ideas until one grabs me by the balls and says ‘Create me!’.