Destroy me... it works!

By Alison

Last week, I didn't blog. I was unavailable, you see, because I was stuck in the lowest, darkest pit of hell, chained to a computer, inches away from complete and total insanity.  Okay, maybe that's an exageration... but just a slight one.

There were no actual chains.

I was finishing up my revise, which, as it turned out, was more of a rewrite, the second 200 pages almost all new. That last week, I was writing 30 pages a day at the very least. I barely ate anything that wasn't caffeinated, didn't get more than three hours of sleep in a night. I didn't leave the house except to go to my office Monday. I worried my family. I missed both nights of American Idol.

The manuscript was due at 4 PM on Friday. I turned it in at 3:59. I wrote the last 50 pages that day, and since I was technically "working from home," the magazine called me at noon and asked me to write an Angelina Jolie story, due at 1:30. I did a phone briefing with the executive editor at 12, went back to writing the novel. Put it aside at 1, wrote the Angelina story, turned it in at 1:15, and went back to the novel, my fingers barely leaving the keyboard. There was no time to complain, no time for Itotallysuckitis. I was a writing machine. A tortured, broken machine, but mechanized nonetheless. At 4, after I turned the book in, I couldn't stop crying.

Well, on Saturday afternoon, I got notes from my editor for the polish. They were great notes and not all that hard to do. Mostly cutting and combining scenes, to increase suspense. And they were all from the FIRST 200 pages. She loved all the stuff I wrote while tortured -- the 200 pages I wrote in roughly a week and a half. I'm psyched she liked that, and glad to be done, but it scares me a little. I told another writer friend about this, and she said, "Maybe that's what you need to do your best stuff. Maybe you need to be close to death or a nervous breakdown, or both."  She's right. Hate to think it, but she is. I look back on all the plot twists that just sort of came out of me, the structural problems I managed to solve, and I realize I couldn't have done it without the two Ds: desperation and delirium.  I'm hoping, the next time around, I can be inspired to do my best in healthier ways. My editor suggested setting up a series of false, but impossible deadlines for me. This might work.

But I keep thinking why can't meditation do it for me? Or a change of scenery? Or a nice, mind-clearing jog?

What I'd like to know now is, what does it for you? In order to create your best work, do you need to be tortured, like me? Or are you inspired via healthier means?

Comments

[David Terrenoire]

I have to have a deadline.

I also like spanking, but that has little to do with writing.

[Brett Battles]

I wish I knew, I have a deadline looming and I'm scared I'm going to have to enter the zone you just exited!!! God help me....

[Keith Raffel]

Alison, your story reminds of my thesis. I wrote over half of it in the last month. I'd write all day, type some, and then give it to a friend who would type more while I slept a few hours. All I did was write, type, and sleep a little. (I don't remember eating.) Turned it in at 4.55PM on July 31 -- five minutes early.

[Lori G. Armstrong]

We're blood sisters here, Alison. Sweating it, crying it, having it burst from our cracked fingertips as we're frantically typing.

As a writer, I've always been pretty anti-outline. I have a general idea of what I want to get across, I know the 10 or so "black moments" and most of the plot twists. That's always worked for me (knock wood) However, the romance I'm working on till the wee small hours was fully outlined when I sold it - the first book of the 10 or so I've written that I've approached that way. Hmm. And I've managed to crank out 42K in eleven days, so I'm beginning to think there IS something to this outlining stuff. Sure, I haven't followed the outline to the letter, but the story is there, and it is still fresh. And believe it or not, I'm having fun working on it, despite my tunnel vision, my messy house, unpaid bills and neglected husband and children.

Suffer for your art, baby. Your book is gonna rock the world :)

[JDRhoades]

You know I hear stories of the pulp fiction writers I love who supposedly cranked 50,000 world Gold Medal paperback novels out in a week and I wonder what I'm doing wrong.

[Karen]

I can't work like that, that said from a person who's written 20 inch stories in half an hour. But that's a different thing. The story is already there, in my notebook. Making shit up is so much harder. And doing it in such a short time frame would make me insane, and not in a good way. My work would totally suck. I'm in awe of those of you who can do this.

[Stacey Cochran]

I've written ten novels (as everyone here knows, they're as yet unpublished). As such, none of them have been written under deadline.

However, I think I could crank out a 50,000 word suspense novel under a month. I've done it twice before.

What's really crippled me the past 2-3 years is writing and knowing that there's no home for the novel when done.

That's when it takes mind-numbing perseverance.

But if I had a regular publisher who I could count on the publish my novels when done, I'd have no problem writing 200-300,000 words per year.

Stacey
http://www.staceycochran.com

[spyscribbler]

My best stuff definitely comes when I'm "living" the story and totally immersed in it. Stressful and exhausting, but ... it works.

I prefer not to do it that way, though. Or at least to do it with some balance, LOL.

[spyscribbler]

Oh! And congratulations! I'm glad you survived!

[toni mcgee causey]

Yikes, Karen, I am approaching a deadline, too, and am starting to fear your description coming true over here. Or I just may spontaneously combust. Congrats on finishing and on the editor liking it!

[AlisonGaylin]

Thanks for all your comments, guys -- and good luck to Brett, Toni, Lori and everyone else with looming deadlines. Remember, it feels so good when you stop! When you're done, you can reward yourself with champagne, a night out (or in...) or, in David's case, a spanking.

[AlisonGaylin]

Thanks for all your comments, guys -- and good luck to Brett, Toni, Lori and everyone else with looming deadlines. Remember, it feels so good when you stop! When you're done, you can reward yourself with champagne, a night out (or in...) or, in David's case, a spanking.