i used to joke that the worst thing in my life was that george r.r martin still hadn't published the
wins of winter i have this theory that the last two books in the song of ice and fire series
are all finished and he's holding back the releases because the expectations would
kill him he'd rather spend the rest of his life editing and he certainly could because editing is
an infinite process and theoretically the longer you spend editing the better the piece will get
writing a great book especially when you have enormous distractions like wealth and fame
or a regular full-time job takes a lot of time some lucky writers churn out books after books
series after series like it's an annual event while other writers struggle to get one great
short story published in their lifetime this makes me wonder what's happening isn't writing
consistently the key the higher your word count the more books you'll write right
getting the word count up may be easy for some and hard for others but regardless of how challenging
it is to get the words on the paper the next part editing will be twice as challenging
when we think of writers we often think of them in the act of typing creating the words but what
writers are as well are editors they need to take what they've written all the words they've typed
and polished them up so all together it becomes a cohesive story worth reading depending on the
project this can mean more research or it could mean rewriting the whole story from a different
perspective or it could mean restructuring the plot so it's no longer in a linear timeline
whatever the editing requirements are and there always are some this is where the work truly
begins there are days where you will stare at the screen and debate whether you should cut a word
or the whole sentence there are days where you won't add to your word count there are days where
you'll be losing words there are days where you feel as though you are undoing all you've created
reversing the time and effort you spent writing there are many phases where story can die and from
the first to second draft is a common place for a work in progress to remain in that status forever
you've written yourself into a place where it's futile to even edit
quitting is the natural solution how do you get yourself out of this hell save your project
and salvage all the work you've done there's no simple answer for this question
a lot of it will depend on you but be sure of this the likelihood of you starting a new project
and getting it past this phase is unlikely if you can't get past this phase this time
yes it might be a whole new project and you might be able to write yourself clear of any plot holes
but how can you steer clear of these hazards if you can't identify and resolve them this time
starting a new project and tracking your growing word count is enticing especially
after you've been trapped in your current story and you're not seeing any progress or movement
but the time you spend struggling to repair your work whether it's by conducting interviews
or participating in a writing workshop or just staring at the screen it doesn't matter
these experiences are qualitative it makes you a better writer by examination the better you become
at reviewing your work and not only composing you'll become a better storyteller all around
counting words on a page may feel great seeing the giant documents saved under your hard drive
is something to be proud of however your dedication to making it better your patience to
sin from the words you've written and look at all of it objectively and not get overly emotional or
discouraged will be the greatest power you wield going forward into your writing career are you
failing to see any progress in your work check out this video here about how to stay motivated
and for more videos about writing and the creative process don't forget to subscribe