aquafit |

In the middle of August, I took a big risk and made a somewhat rash and public pledge on this blog: Finish my novel by September 30 or…

…well, I didn’t say what the “or” might be. Only that you, dear reader, would hold me accountable. And yes, you certainly did.

Just a reminder: I compared my sluggish progress on my novel in progress to how I dropped out of aquafit some years ago (the old “life gets in the way” excuse) but that returning to regular exercise was finally showing some results.

I reasoned the same could happen for my novel, if I only made it a regular habit to write…the novel. (I write almost every day, just not always the novel.) In fact, there have been times I’d slipped so far away from the story that I couldn’t recall important plot elements.

On Friday, September 30, I “finished” The Last Battlewipe. And then spent the next four days making it better.

I’m still not done with the editing but I can happily report that my self-imposed kick in the pants has generated much more than a full draft. I also gained three other important results.

Result Number One:

Once I made the commitment to get the darn thing done, I had to shift my thinking from write to reach the finish to a much more challenging finish to reach the writing. Accordingly, I became far more focused on the vital pieces of the novel: character arc, story structure, logic/plot glitches and glossovers.

The very act of committing to finishing the work meant I had to think deeply about what I was trying to achieve and ensure that this was foremost as I wrote those final scenes.

Result Number Two:

I’m excited again. Like a teenaged love affair, writing is often all starry eyed and passionate at the start. It’s an adventure following those characters, letting them surprise me, discovering personality quirks and adorable idiosyncrasies.

Until the “adorable” wears off and I realize I’ve let my characters and story run off the rails following a lot of useless material. And I’m bored.

For a lot of writers, it’s at that point that the murky, muddy middle of the book wears you down.

Enter the panic of a public deadline coupled with the realization that I have a lot more novels waiting for me to write. I had to finish this one. And all that panic stuff – it made the writing exciting for me once more. But because of Result Number One, I brought focus to the rekindled love affair. So much better to be a grown up.

Result Number Three:
Last month, I had a fantastic pitch session at North Words Literary Festival. A query letter and the first ten pages resulted in an enthusiastic agent asking to see the rest.

I left that festival on a tremendous high: someone gets me and what I’m trying to do with The Last Battlewipe. So how was it that the first ten pages so intrigued the agent when I was still building the last quarter?

First, to keep working on the ending I had to revisit the beginning. Again. And again. Those ten pages that agent read were shaped and pared and rewritten dozens of times. Every time I set a stone in place at the end of the book, I had to return to the foundation and ensure it could hold that stone.

Second, I believe if I hadn’t got back to the story, I wouldn’t have been clear in my mind about the themes and ideas I am exploring in The Last Battlewipe. And I think my heightened focus and restored passion for my novel is contagious. I was able to carry that focus and passion into the session. It’s no guarantee that my wonderful fifteen minute pitch time will land me that agent but it sure was the 2 a.m. rocket fuel that has kept me focused on perfecting the finish line.

One more thing.

My aquafit regime? Ooops. I’ve let that one slip and my recent BIC (bum in chair) has done little to get my physical energy back on track. So I am still “a work in progress” on more than one front. But I guess we all are.

I’ll keep you posted. Meanwhile, back to the edit chair.

Do You Know…what an agent will see when they look at your query letter? Register for our November retreat when a top Canadian literary agent, Hilary McMahon, is Writescape’s special guest and she’s staying for the weekend to share insights, inspiration and a morning workshop.

Years ago, I was a committed aquafit attendee. Underwater lunges, leg lifts by the jets, jogging through chlorinated pools—it all turned my crank. I went twice a week with my best friend, Linda. We had a blast, challenging each other to push harder, harder. We churned up big waves with our enthusiasm and built up some wonderful stamina and energy. Aquafit helped keep me healthier and decidedly thinner.

But life got in the way. I lost interest. And, you know, aquafit just moved to the backburner of “I’ll sign up next year.”

Several years and pounds later, I find myself back in aquafit. A new year’s resolution I opted to actually keep. But man oh man, what happened to make water churning so much harder? Linda and I were iron-women back in the day. Now, I’m feeling far more like rubber-woman. Sometimes even like sopping wet cardboard-woman. I swear they added molecules to the pool.

But I will say that several weeks in, I recognized some of the old iron-woman coming back to me. And by the end of June, I had more energy and fewer pounds. Don’t get me wrong. It will be a long time before I can jog in the pool like a whirlpool on steroids. If ever. But my confidence is up. And I’ve managed to keep a quasi-schedule over the summer with a less strenuous program in the cottage river. I’m looking forward to signing back up in September at the local pool.

And that, believe it or not, gives me hope on an unfinished manuscript that lingers in my computer. This 79,000+ word novel started out like most of my writing. I always write because I want to know the answers that I set up whenever I start a story or poem. And I set up a lot of thematic questions with this one: gender, politics, genetics and nature versus nurture. I was pumped to explore them and it was going great.

But sometimes —just like why I had to give up aquafit years ago—life gets in the way of writing. And sometimes, a writer can lose confidence. And then lose the connection to the heart of the story. And finally, simply lose interest. And that combination is deadly. My poor muse has been whispering in my ear for weeks and I just kept shrugging my shoulders and looking for distractions.

Man, I sure needed a kick in the pants. This post is my public announcement and thus, my self-kick in the pants. You, dear Top Drawer reader, will hold me accountable. Like my return to aquafit, I’m diving back into the pool of novel completion.

I’ve given myself a deadline. September 30: a complete manuscript ready for beta readers. Until then, I’ll be doing the backstroke, butterfly, crawl, freestyle…anything I can do on the keyboard to swim to the finish line. And the only record I’m looking for is to achieve completion on or before September 30.

I’ll let you know if I make it.

aquafit

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