Write your first novel right now. No, seriously. Get out a pen or your prefered means of transcribing and get going right now. Don’t have an idea? Even better.
"What terrible advice is this? What does he know, he hasn’t even been published."
The former may seem true and the latter is, but believe me, this isn’t my first rodeo. For those of you who don’t know, every year the writing community comes together as a collective in a challenge to write a novel in one month during the month of November (finals month of course, as though college life wasn’t hard enough). I had never heard of the challenge, known colloquially as NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) which challenges writers to write a novel of more than 50,000 words, 10,000 words more than the standard criteria for a novel. What was I thinking? I don’t know, but last November I participated in NaNoWriMo with gusto. I was sleeping three hours a night all November long, working on a novel I had formulated on the fifth of the month having started five days late. There was a point where I actually caught up with the curve and was performing above what I needed to successfully close my piece up.
Did I finish? You better believe I didn’t, honestly: I didn’t stand a chance. Once I moved beyond the soul crushing sense of defeat, I found out — that it was OK. Because in writing your first novel you learn so much about the writing process that it will pay dividends later. Let me explain.
In my first novel the first three chapters were a cumulative of 9,000 words. Depending on the novel you are writing this isn’t necessarily a problem, my problem was that my novel required more of me. My scenes weren’t as full as they could be, it was apparent I was racing headlong for the finish to feel a sort of accomplishment rather than give my characters the justice they deserved. Their stories wanted to be told but I had no idea how to extend my scenes, how to bring in extended metaphors and how to make the book come alive rather than convey what needed to be said. By my fourth day I was extending each of my chapters by 2,000 words so that by the time I gave in a completed the school work I had been slacking on my book was like a slinky going downstairs—stretched in the beginning and thinly working toward the end which was thick and worthwhile. By comparison my newest novel (still in progress) I am halfway through chapter three and my word count is 17,000.
By failing to write my first novel I learned to produce at a larger volume, where one thousand words was a daunting task to me before my first flop now, if I don’t write 1,800 words in a day I feel like a slacker. While 1,000 words would take me hours before I have begun hitting that number in just over an hour—sometimes less. This isn’t to say you are failing if you don’t write at the same pace as me, everyone is different and if your goal is 500 a day then hitting that is something to praise and from one writer to another: I’m proud of you.
Writing that first story that goes nowhere is like gravel. To build a road to a beautiful thing you first need to lay down gravel so your asphalt has something to rest on. Let your second novel (your true first) ride on the bones of your first flop.
Don’t stress your success or lack thereof. Allow me to part ways with some rays of hope. I hold an envelope to my head and say: E.E. Cummings and Stephen King. I tear the letter open and read: Two writers who couldn’t get their first books published. There is always hope faithful writer—write what you know, what you love, and you can die a happy artist.
