Reminiscing on where I’ve been

I’ve spent time lately thinking back on my writing career so far, the ups and downs, and the big turning points that led me to where I am now. So I’d like to outline how I did it. This won’t be exactly in chronological order, since stuff often happened simultaneously, or in stops and starts.

The Indie Revolution

Mentioning this first, because indie publishing is what catapulted me from being a forever wannabe to published author. Simply being alive in this time period, right now, was a huge boost to my creativity and the ability to bring my work to market.

To be honest, I didn’t jump whole heartedly into the indie movement. Probably back in 2009 or so, I read about what Joe Konrath was doing, and thinking he was a flake for self publishing his novels. I had a lot of emotional energy invested in the traditional publishing game. At least three years went by before I really paid attention to what Konrath and the other early adopters of the indie movement were doing.

I published my first short stories in 2012. By 2014 I’d figured out how to do things properly by setting up a publishing company for my work.

National Novel Writing Month

I’m not entirely sure when I first attempted writing a novel—around the age of 10 or so, which of course I never finished. I made more a serious attempt after I left college for the first time, in 2005.

In 2008, during the recession crisis, I had my own personal crisis of what I wanted to do next. And I determined I really wanted to be a writer. So I researched how to become one, and National Novel Writing Month made an appearance on my Google search.

I failed at my first attempt with “only” 44,000 words. The next year I completed my first novel (which didn’t get published until 2021, almost 12 years later). I continued to produce novels and even short stories during NaNo.

I’ve long since walked away from that community. But NaNo was the initial push to making me an author.

Education

Tons of learning. I read Writers Digest for years. Read lots of how-to books from many different writers. I was a member of Forward Motion for a long time, and took the 2 Year Novel class there (which is where that first novel was developed from). I took Holly Lisle’s workshops.

I read lots of blogs for both craft and business. Jim Butcher’s blog in particular gave me a solid foundation for craft. And then I took Dean Wesley Smith’s workshops. I think in 2015, I took one of his classes every month for half the year. That alone pushed me far out ahead on the learning curve.

Heinlein’s Rules

Not sure when I first learned about Heinlein and his infamous rules, but I know I disregarded them at first. Wasn’t for me, couldn’t do it, the usual excuses. Probably around 2012 when I really dove deep into the rules and discovered how to use them.

Now I use them as a troubleshooting checklist when I fall off. Am I writing? Finishing projects? Editing too much? Are my stories on the market?

Lester Dent’s Master Plot Formula

Hard to underestimate how important this goofy relic from the 1920s is to my understanding of craft. Once I learned it and studied it to death, this was a game changer for me.

The vast majority of my erotic fiction is me practicing the plot formula. No joke, I took something intended for mystery plots and bent it to erotic and romantic plots, and in the process learned a great deal about fiction writing.

The Long Streak

I mentioned this in the previous post. I had a daily writing streak that stretched from 2015 to 2019, about 1,600 days. The daily practice took me further down the road than any single blog or how-to book.

And now where to next? Well, I’m slowly climbing back on and getting back to where I was. So currently I’m back to learning and practice as much as I can.