Novel Writing: Never Good Enough.

I don't know why I'm writing this. It started with an idea that seemed good, but before I even wrote the first word, I started to question myself. "Why bother? Only a handful of people are going to read it, and they don't care. They might leave some supportive comments, but at the end of the day, they'll go on with their lives just the same as if they hadn't read it. It doesn't matter."

That's what goes through my head (or some variant of it) every day I try to write something. Doesn't matter if it's another chapter of my latest book, a dumb blog about video games, or something like this. And it doesn't go away after writing for a few minutes, not usually anyway. At least not with this one. Sometimes I get into the groove, and get some serious work done, but not as often as I used to be able to. Back when I was young and naïve. You know, a couple years ago.

Let me give some back story here, because I'm starting to lose the thread a little with regards to the main point. I've been writing blogs about video games on and off since...2006, I think. A lot of the older stuff is lost to time (and good riddance to it), but I've written a lot of stuff on the internet. And even of the stuff that's still there, most of it is nonsense. Intentionally so, mind you, but still nonsense. I've had a lot of fun, and I've met some great people in the course of doing so over the years.

But then, in 2011, while I was still in college, I had the brilliant idea to start writing a novel, because clearly that was a better use of my time than trying to figure out what kind of a career to get after I graduated. Because, obviously, I was going to be able to write a hit novel, and never have to get a real job because the money would come flooding in.

Like I said, I was young and naïve. But, I stuck with it, and about a year later, I had a finished product that I was happy with. Of course, during the course of that year I gave up on trying to get it actually published, because that process seemed too hard and time consuming, so I just self-published it on Amazon. There I met a rousing success where tens of people downloaded the book, and most of them were from when the book was free to "promote" it. The idea being that people get it free, read it, like it, and recommend it to people that then pay money for it. I'm pretty sure most of them just downloaded it, and never touched it again.

However, I wasn't deterred. I had written a book, and my friends/a couple people on the internet said they legitimately liked it. So, I started working on a sequel. But I wanted to aim higher, and make something bigger and more ambitious. And I did. As a result, it ended up taking longer to write than the first. Of course, it didn't help that during the course of the later editing stages, I ran into "small" problems like a month-long bout with some of the worst depression of my life, and being hospitalized and then diagnosed with an incurable intestinal disease (nothing life threatening).

But, I eventually got it to a state where I thought it was acceptable to publish, and I did. Where I met a rousing success where tens of people downloaded it, almost all of them from a free promotion. As downtrodden as I was by my continued failures, I couldn't stop. While the first book could have stood alone, the second clearly left it open for the third in the trilogy, and I had to see it through to the end.

And now, here I am.

It's been a couple months since I started writing it. Probably closer to four, actually, I don't really know off hand. I started strong, but ran into some issues early on. I was trying too hard to make the third book "edgier," for lack of a better word, and ended up scrapping a lot of the three or four chapters that I had written. I started over, and got onto a much better track than I had been on.

But the more time that passed, the harder and harder I've found it to focus on what I've been writing. It's hard to justify working on something that maybe three or four other people will actually read to completion, most of them being close friends that are reading it not because they would have sought out this thing and read it anyway, but because I wrote it, and I asked them to.

It's demoralizing, and I think I may be approaching my breaking point. I thought that by writing this, maybe I would get a better grip on what I have accomplished as a writer, and that would boost my morale. And, it is an accomplishment. I've written two full novels, both of which are good (according to my friends), and that's more than most people can say. Hell, that's probably more than most authors can say. It should be something that I'm proud of, and that I brag about.

It's not. I just get disgusted and depressed when I think about it. That I've spent countless hours of my life working on these stupid books that no one cares about. And when I say "countless," I mean it literally. I have no idea how many hours I've spent either actually writing, or just thinking about these books. Walking around, I'll be thinking about what to do next, what characters I need to create, how to justify including stupid things like a castle siege, or a bank heist into them. There were times in college when I couldn't get this stuff off my mind, and I was spending all of my waking hours thinking about it.

Like I said before, I don't know why I'm writing this. It's only making me feel worse, not better. A part of me thought that maybe it could at least be some well written thing that helps examine some deep, inner meaning, or some BS like that. Just seems like a rambling mess to me. I shouldn't even post this, but I will, because I've spent time working on it instead of my book. Or studying for that driver's license test I've got to take before my permit expires next month.

I don't even remember what the original point of all this was. Something about the books, and it not being good enough? In retrospect, of course it was stupid of me to expect anything more than what has happened. And it's my fault too, for not putting in the effort to try to get an actual publisher to actually publish one of these books. But what's the point? No one's going to read these books and say, "Oh yeah, I'll approve company resources to print this dumb thing and sell it in stores." Nothing about what I've written seems anything at all like what people want to read these days, or at least what publishers think that people want to read these days. And of course they don't, I'm a weirdo writing to my own, weird tastes. I could try to write something that appeals to more people. Just ape the boring "young adult" novels that seem to be all the craze today. But why do that when I can write a sweeping space opera that has everything from Space Nazis to Guerrilla Dragons fighting for freedom with GUNS?

I think I figured out why I've written all this. It's because I'm depressed, angry, blaming myself, and don't have any other way to try to vent my frustrations. And would you have guessed that it's not working, and only making me feel worse? I think I already said it's made me feel worse, actually.

I'm not going to stop writing though. Not yet. I'm maybe a third of the way into this next book, perhaps even forty percent. Even if the end product ends up a terrible piece of steaming garbage, I'll feel worse in the long run if I just give up. I have no clue when it'll be done, but I'll finish it one day. And at this rate, it'll probably be the last thing I ever write. Or the last big thing, at least.

If you've actually read all this, then thanks. It still means something when people actually care enough to read all the way through, even if I acknowledge that it's not very good. Unless you just skipped to the end, at which point you are basically history's newest greatest monster.

I feel your pain, brother. I do a bit of writing myself and know all too well the depression and lack of self-worth that follows after you spend so, so many hours of your life creating a thing that might account to nothing. Only thing I can tell you is if you stop loving it, then you should maybe take a break for a while. Or maybe just scale back your projects to short stories. Creation is a tough thing to do, even if creation is the easiest part.

I feel like you're going about this the wrong way. When I do something creative, it's a way of expressing my emotions and hopefully getting rid of, or at least rationalising, any negativity in my life at that point. I'm not looking for widespread acceptance of what I do or any sort of financial benefit.

Be creative for yourself, not for others.

I've struggled to write... for as long as I can remember, honestly. I've never had any success, really, only ever put one thing out there for anyone but myself to read and it's the embarrassing sort of old shame that I'm not keen to look back on, even if at the time people seemed to enjoy it. I signed up for 750Words to force myself to write more often, and for months and months I was putting out short little stories or essays or journal entries, sometimes just re-writing my old stuff again and again to improve on it even a bit. A lot of the time, I ended up liking the first versions better anyways. It didn't matter because I enjoyed it, even if it was just something for me that no one else was ever gonna see.

Over time, I sorta fell out of that habit. (And 750Words announced they'd start charging cash, so I deleted my account... and then they promptly announced a week later that people who already had accounts would keep free access. Motherfucker!) I still try to write, but it's harder these days, and I've made little to no progress on any of my big ideas or 'dream projects' or whatever you'd want to call them; the shit I'd actually dream about publishing as an actual book some day, basically. One thing I can usually do, and that makes me feel pretty good, is just to write about whatever dumb thing I want to; not caring if it's stupid, or bad, or if anyone else is ever even going to know it exists. Sometimes it's really liberating just to write for yourself.

I said a whole bunch of nothing up there, but I guess the point I was trying to get to somehow was that, if you're enjoying yourself and getting some good practice in, it really doesn't matter if anyone else is gonna read it. Keep working, and if it's good for you, I think that's good enough. Then again I have low standards.

Been there. Best advice I can give is just write something that you yourself would want to read and there will be an audience for it somewhere out there.

Yes, write something that really matters to you.

The lack of audience thing can definitely be very depressing, but dude, you wrote two novels. Seeing as how both meet your personal standards (which seem pretty high) they can, at the very least, be looked at as valuable lessons that have undoubtedly made you a better writer. If nothing more, you can look at them as practice, not a waste of time. I'm 22 and have started many failed projects (especially during my teen years) that were never finished because they were either too ambitious for my skill level or I didn't have enough research and experience with the subject matter. I look back at these abortions sometimes and laugh at them. I find that doing so gives me a bit of a confidence boost and shows how I've managed to improve over the last few years. It took me way longer than it should've to realize that you gotta write not only what you're passionate about, but what you know inside and out.

You really shouldn't beat yourself up about the Amazon numbers either. That market is so saturated that it's incredibly difficult to get noticed through it even if you have a great story. The same thing happens to bands on bandcamp or producers on beatport or short filmmakers on Youtube. If it's your passion, keep at it, even if the thought of failure can be depressing as all Hell.

Thanks for the nice comments, everyone. :D

I was just feeling really depressed this morning when I wrote that, but I'm doing a bit better now. It definitely helps to read nice things from other people.

Write because you enjoy it (if you do, which you should). Trying to write to be famous, popular, or well-known is just asking to be disappointed, as a large percentage of writers never amount to anything--a sad but truthful fact. If you write stuff because you enjoy writing it, and don't worry about what other people think, you should be fine.

As a fellow writer, I've felt this at times. I've written plenty of game reviews that no one will likely ever read and a handful of stories that I have only shared with my family. Guess what? I've enjoyed writing them all, even knowing that likely no one will read them. It's fun taking my thoughts and putting them down on a page. Would I like to be more successful? Sure, and I'm always working to be a better writer. I know, however, that the writing has to be about me first or else it's all for nothing.

If this still doesn't help, think of it this way: if your piece of writing affects at least one person out there, it's done its job.

Are you writing the novel because it's what you want to do, or because you don't know what else to do?

Get out of my head!

That's my thought process for pretty much everything, and why I go play video games or watch movies/tv rather than do anything (and those are the good days, which are unfortunately not happening so frequently these days). It sucks.

You, on the other hand, have written books. That's fucking amazing. I can't imagine how the hell you did it. I can barely work up the motivation to read a book at this point.

Fucking bad days, though. I certainly can relate to that. They suck.

I know, and every day I remind myself that it is an accomplishment. But it just gets overwhelmed when I'm not feeling well, and you know the rest.

Again, thanks for the kind words. :D

I don't have much to add that hasn't already been said. Everybody that has chimed in seems pretty wise. I get those same feelings when I write but luckily I have a very supportive wife that can encourage me without throwing off my expectations. I always think that at least some day my kids might think it's neat.

Also I think if you really do want to get published you should get an agent to sell your book. The CEO of Simon & Schuster mentioned that when she came to my college a few years ago.

@mooseymcman: You can do it moosey.

What's that hanging over your head? A dark cloud of fatalism about never getting anyone to read your stuff? Duder, have I been there.

After finishing my first novel, I went through query letter hell last year. After a few promising leads, I eventually came up with nothing. Zero agents who wanted to publish my book. It was disheartening as hell, but I eventually just had to accept something: this is my first novel. There is literally no time in my writing career that I will be as shitty as I am right now. Many novels don't ever get published no matter how hard the author worked; first novels, the odds are even worse. I am still incredibly proud of what I wrote, but ultimately, in the face of failure, I had to reconsider that entire novel as a purely instructional exercise.

I'm working on another novel now, and baking in all the hard lessons I learned from my first. Going pretty well, so far. It's pretty amazing how much the act of just starting something new can lift the spirit. Writing appeals to me for much the same reason that reading does: I get to visit new worlds, meet new people. And I'm knee deep in a whole lot of new shit right now, so that's pretty great.

Anyway, I'm glad that your second post seems more optimistic, because self-doubting writers always pique my empathy. Just keep writing what you like, duder. That's what I'm going to do: write what I like, because writing brings me joy. And if someone decides to hand me a six-figure advance for it, then that'd be nice too.

(Also, before turning to self-pub, try by any means available to get a literary agent. Fuck how daunting it looks, just do it! If you don't already have a following who will seek your work out, self-pub is a huge crapshoot, as I'm sure you know.)

Yep, I know this feel. I went to uni to get a BFa. I worked very hard and managed it, despite some of the mental difficulties I have. When I graduated, I did freelance illustration for a while, learned how soul crushing that job is. In my spare time I wrote two graphic novels. They represent a couple thousand hours of work, each. I hate both of them. I had a mental breakdown. Quit freelance job. I don't draw anymore. I never want to do it again. Not as a hobby and not as a profession.

No advice from me. Just sympathy. :)

@demoskinos said:

@mooseymcman: You can do it moosey.

Great, now you've just got me thinking about hair shadows again! :P

No lie, the other day I was watching my friend play through the end of MGS4 (it was his first time) and I found myself staring at shadows to see if they had hair (it was inconclusive).

I put The Allegiance of Justice on my nephews' Kindle and they both loved it. (I haven't read my copy yet.)

What's the sequel called? I can sell two copies with one phone call.

Well, how old are your nephews? The second one gets pretty dark near the end, because I was in a low-ish point at that point depression-wise, and it's not really family friendly like the first one. I'd say mid-teens would be more appropriate (it's got some mild swearing, and just general dark/mature-er themes).

However, dang if reading that doesn't make me filled with joy!

Edit: The name is SPACE COPS 5000. I know, I didn't really do much in the title to connect the two.

You wrote two novels.

Pal, no, listen to me: you placed TWO, MEANINGFUL THINGS into existence.

You know what that means, right? You have placed yourself in history. You are apart of the conduit we contemporary people constitute, one that billions of our future sons and daughters will look back on to wonder how things were like in our time. Because of you, they will know our culture, notions, and what enticed us. That, in my humble opinion, is something to be proud of. No matter the quality of your books, it is inevitable that you will not be forgotten as books are necessary for mankind's position to carry on, even through death.

Sure, you may not be something as of this moment; the majority of us won't be. But it is those that are valued highly, like celebrities and erudites, that will be realized as something unnecessary, wrong, and not as special as their followers may have thought as it is history which always changes through the revelation of new discoveries that update our pathos and ethos, realizing that the foolish nobodies of the past were actually the prophets we needed.

And consider emphasis on the word "may". You still have time on this planet to show your species that you are capable to doing great things. Your two books only garnered 10 people? Write a third one. If it isn't working out, think of something else. In due time, you will have enough novels that you will have established something; a bit of a cult following, even a following of denizens who know your name and your style. Two books will not give you these fans, but maybe it's that third one that will. But it is always in due time, for it is always the future that counts.

@tru3_blu3: Haha, I know. I should update the blog to say that I was really depressed when I wrote that blog, and not thinking super clearly. I'm feeling better now though, and yes, everything you said is 100% true.

I think they're 12 or 13 (twins), but both of them are pretty voracious readers. They'll be alright as long as it doesn't go full Easton Ellis.

I've been writing in some form or another regularly since I was about twelve years old. It started out as a form of therapy for me. I would write songs, because I could never get into writing diary entries. I'd scribble in the margins of my notes, or in my agenda, during the school day. It was a constant way for me to work out/through the emotional overload that I was almost constantly going through.

Then I began writing my own books. I was about fourteen at this point, so they were about as awful as you could imagine. But I had a whole family tree, and pairings for an entire series, as well as character bios. It was hokey, but it was important basics. I ditched them, and started writing in other ways in the years that followed, ways that I'm still writing today.

I'm about to embark on starting a novel again, and I am continuously putting it off for fear of failure, and fear that I will not meet my own admittedly unreasonable personal standards. But I know that I'm going to get over that hump, and I know that I'm going to write that book. And it may never see the light of day in distribution. No publisher may want to touch it. And those are demons that haunt me.

But it would be my book. That I wrote. That I put out there. Something that I created. With my own mind, by myself. And that's enough for me.

I guess what I'm getting at, is that we (writers, and really anybody in the creative fields), will always be our own worst enemies. It's learning how to love what you do, and love it for yourself.

To echo what people have already said...you wrote two books! That's amazing. You're writing another. That's even more amazing! It's healthy to be critical of yourself to a degree, but you can't let your own worries and critiques prevent you from doing what is obviously a driving force in your life. You're a writer, dude.

And please remember (I'm so sorry this is so corny, I'll see myself out afterwards), that even if one person reads your book, that is the chance to impact somebody's life, if even in the smallest of ways. People find inspiration in the most unexpected, and sometimes mundane, places. There's plenty of reason to believe that they could find it in one of your novels.

Also, I'm bookmarking this thread for my own inevitable need in the future.

When I was in high school I decided that I wanted to write a book. It wasn't anything special, just some fantasy thing involving people fighting each other with magic powers (pretty lame I know.) Eventually I got to where you are know and I game up on it. I felt fine at first and I didn't give giving up on on my book a second thought. Time passed and a few years later I started thinking about that silly book of mine and I was overcome by a powerful urge to finish writing it. I had one problem, I lost the manuscript. It had been so long since I looked at it that I completely forgot where I hid it. I felt awful, I hated myself. I looked and looked but I never found that manuscript. It still bothers me today that I never had a chance to finish it, even if no one would ever read it and I kept it all to myself just knowing that I was able to complete something like writing a book would be enough to make it all worth something.

Don't give up and never give in. Keep writing, if not for others then for yourself. It doesn't matter if no one ever sees your writings, all that matters is that you keep writing about things that matter to you. You never know, one day your writings might come across the eyes of someone that becomes truly connected to your works and if this person is the right guy they might get published. You finished one book, which is more then I can say about myself, so you should deferentially finish your second one. If you ever feel like sharing I'd love to read what what you have!

I don't know what that means! I don't think there's anything in there that would be scarring for life, but I don't know! It's hard to go into details without spoiling anything. It's a pretty different type of book too. The first was a straightforward adventure, whereas this one's more of a detective/crime thing. I dunno, I mean, I'm not going to complain if people are reading it, but make sure they know it's not the same exact type of thing as the first one. I wouldn't be surprised if they didn't like it if they're not into crime/mystery stuff.

I wanted to do something different, you know?

@mercy_: Good luck with your future writing! And yes, I know, even having one person read it and enjoy it is something special, and I've had more than that! :D

I actually remember your comment from one of Rorie's blogs where he mentions that Amazon self published books were poop from his butt or something. I thought your book sounded mad interesting (SPACE COPS 5000 is a great title) but alas I have no iPad or Kindle to read a digital book :(

Writing even one novel in and of itself is incredible because there are tons of people out there like me who struggle to write even one paragraph. You wrote two and are working on a third! For what it's worth, that is impressive to me.

Hey man, writing is tough. At least you have finished things out in the world.

My half finished novel about a broken family through the eyes of an imaginative child will probably stay half finished for a very, very long time.

Keep on writing! Best of luck!

I will tell you this ... I am supposedly a creative person , I have 2 finished scripts (and working on many) I draw constantly , I want to make animations since I was 14 (when I figured that programming for making games wasnt my cup of tea) and you know what Im doing with my life? Cleaning fucking bird shit from eggs and not a single animation on my name , for me duder you are a rockstar ,hero and a grown up human being :D someone who had an idea and followed through with it , which is still better than 99% of the people on this planet. I have allowed that doubt to slow... nay stop me from trying and every day I regret it and now im in a position were I have to delay it , to clean fucking shit from eggs to try to pay debts that I have incured in because soemone else fucked up and dragged me along and I keep making excuses and not seeing my dreams come true to earn a little bit of cash that supposedly will pay off debts but goes away in less than a day :and all I can do is to fuckin clean bird shit from eggs (and sadly im not joking).

You know I post a lot of videos on youtube. I mention it sometimes, but not often. I have never once linked a single vid I have done on Giant Bomb and I don't really intend to. There is this one video though I would say is probably my favorite like "real effort" video I ever did. It was this Demon's Souls pvp tournament where everyone had to cosplay as a NPC from the game. I decided to edit it into a street fighter homage thing. I even hp bars, post fight trash talks, combo counters popping on the side of the screen. I really went the whole nine on it. Between the three videos that make up the whole series I probably spent 60-70 hours editing them. Combined they have maybe 3.5 thousand hits, that is over 4 years of traffic of course.

Meanwhile I have this other vid. I was really into Dragon's Dogma, and when it came out there was day one DLC. It was just like a hair styles pack, nothing major. A few people on the capcom unity forums though wanted to see the hair styles before they dropped like 2 bucks on it to be sure they actually wanted them. I hadn't made my pawn yet but I had bought the DLC cause I was (and still am) a crack whore for Dragon's Dogma. So I make this video where I just go and make my pawn and show off the hairstyles. It is 5 minutes and 30 seconds long. It probably took me... 15 minutes tops to edit it and maybe another 10-15 to encode it. It was a throwaway video I put little to no effort into. Two years later it is easily my most popular video of all time with over 11k hits.

Does that suck? I guess so. However I still watch that street fighter homage vid every 6 months or so when I get a weird urge and I still enjoy it and get a laugh at my corny jokes. I had fun making it and I have fun watching it. That's all that really matters. As long as you are happy with your books and you enjoyed making them then they are great novels worth reading.

And don't forget to write a new blog in due time with the title:

Novel Writting: Good Enough

Haha, I actually used to write fanfiction (yes I know, so horrible), so I can actually kind of relate. I finally came to the point where I realized that It was becoming a complete chore to write anything, and I decided that I wouldn't write for the people reading it - I would write for me. If I enjoy writing it, then that's good enough for me, and who cares how few people will read the end result?

@mooseymcman: First off - always write for yourself. Do it because you like to.

Second - have you ever read Stephen King's "On Writing"? I thought parts of it were pretty interesting. I read it earlier this summer and it got my wheels turning on writing. It got me to consistently blog (not on GB), anyway. Maybe it's worth checking out?

Thank for, for the excellent suggestion, kind sir!