Progress Update

In the end I didn't submit anything to the competition. The process of re-writing to inject more conflict into my story changed a whole bunch of other things. I feel the proper thing to do is to work through all the permutations and finish the book before I decide what to do next.

Thinking about the need for conflict in novels and my initial reluctance to put some in - I think it's because these books are Daydreams, not just for the reader, but the author too. And when daydreaming you tend to want to make the romance sweet and perfect - but of course in published romances they can only get perfect at the end, the start and middle must have conflict otherwise why would anyone bother to read through the twists and turns? I'm also wondering whether I'm suitable for the Presents/Modern line, or whether I should be writing the "sweet" traditional romances. The problem is that as a reader I find the sweet romances too tame, and I like the thrills and sensualitity of Presents. Hmm. Perhaps I need to go on another marathon read to see exactly what excites me about existing published work.

I've also been hampered by getting a whole bunch of other ideas for books. And when I'm seized by the muse like this, I can't help getting on the computer and letting the stuff just pour out of me... As a result I now have four books in progress. One is a fair way to being complete - I've written about 38,000 words (this is the book that I'm re-writing to inject a bit more conflict). The other books are in the initial stages - one with 10,000 words, the others with about 6,000 words each.

I don't know if this is normal or not, but I didn't want to lose the ideas or the excitement they generated, so I had to spend valuable time getting them out there, written. I am conscious however that if I continue like this I'll have a whole bunch of half-finished work and nothing completed. They say that no matter how much you write, you arn't really an author till you've actually completed your novel.