When Worlds Collide

No, not the corny 1952 sci-fi film… balancing writing with a ‘normal’ career – though define ‘normal’ career!  In my case, let’s call it Monday to Friday, 8 till 6 (plus extras when a project or an unforeseen required) and I had a lot more time than many people do: no children, no pets, and one well-trained husband. Still quite demanding to combine the two to any meaningful degree, though, given that at the end of a long and often challenging day, the thought of pen, paper, laptop and desperate search for inspiration was more offputting than tackling a jungle full of brambles with a pair of scissors. Inspiration? Sometimes (often!) far less glamourous – just the tussle for the right word… is ‘soft’ better than ‘gentle’ or would ‘quiet’ work as well? How many times can you use ‘wondered’ before your reader wonders why you haven’t learned to use a thesaurus?

And then that old ‘normal’ career comes to the rescue. My day job had long involved plenty of project work, and the disciplines there proved remarkably useful; writing a book, let alone publishing it, is most decidedly a project! 

So, start with the project plan: what tasks, when, why, how – the outline, the key scenes, the link scenes (in the case of Enough, with three intertwined stories, the correct order to tell which bit of each); the beta read; the first redraft, the second, the third… your copy edit; second beta read; redraft (fourth, fifth, you get the drift); your proof read… Any variations on any of the above!  And from there, you create a defined set of things you need to do to achieve it all – an action log! (In my case, keep a spreadsheet of all those corrections you know you need to make…)

Add some approximate high-level timescales (be realistic, add contingency – and don’t panic!).

Think about things that could get in the way (risks – your faithful laptop explodes); things that will get in the way (you know, sun shining, bestie arrives with wine) and what you’re relying on (assumptions/dependencies – yes, you really will spend all of the weekend when your hubby’s off with his mates writing... [sunshine, bestie, wine]).

Et voila! A plan, with some idea of timescales, and a RAID log. 

In honesty, there were occasions I’d look at my plan and feel somewhere between overwhelmed and desperate, especially when my timescales slipped, but the sense of control and the ability to see the overall picture were vastly reassuring. And nothing beats the feeling of ticking off actions you’ve completed: when I finally had the order of the three stories interlinking properly, I called the bestie and opened the wine, who needed sunshine?

Did it help me write anything when it was the last thing I fancied doing? Actually, yes, it did, as it helped me see where/if I had a bit of wriggle time, what I could rejig or earn back, test how I’d feel if I did slip noticeably behind… and, well, I’ve got the laptop open anyway, I might as well fap in a few words whilst I’m here… 

Now, soft, gentle, or quiet?