A bit of a wobbly

It's hard, the first draft of a new book. Like a having a baby, my average gestation period for a new novel is about nine months, so it's an achievement and a relief to finish what Stephen Kings calls 'the sh*tty first draft'.

Cue champagne and brass bands? Sadly, no. Instead of patting myself on the back, I'm having what in the UK we would call a bit of a wobbly. For non-UK folks, this means unsure, losing confidence, unusually nervous. (Not to be confused with 'throwing a wobbly', which means to become angry and extremely upset).

This is where I start asking:

'Is this any good?'

'Have I wasted all that time?' (all NINE MONTHS?)

'Will anyone care?'

If you've ever written anything - a book, a novella, whatever, you might recognise this feeling.

Part of the process

This will be my 8th novel, and I'm getting to see (finally! I can be slow on the uptake!) that this dip in confidence is just part of the process.

I have to remind myself that this is a first draft - not the finished book. The foundation of a building is never pretty - so it is with the book. It's full of missing information, question marks in the margins, clumsy sentences, but without this, you've got nothing to build on.

The company of other writers

With visibility on book platforms being more and more difficult to gain without huge budgets, for Indie authors, it can often feel as if you're shouting into the void. Which can make the dip in confidence seem insurmountable.

What helps me through are the writer (and non-writer) friends who sharpen their pencils and pick their way through my words to give advice and praise (sometimes - my beta readers have been chosen for their straight-talking), encouragement and suggestions for fixes.

I get feedback, I may go around in a very bad mood for a couple of days, but then, again, I recognise this as part of the process and knuckle down.

'Wobbly' isn't the end

So I guess my point is that however I feel about my first draft, it's not the end of the story (figuratively AND literally). Feedback and re-writing is usually the way to rebalance myself from the (hopefully temporary) writer's wobbly.

Drop a comment to let me know if this is also you, and where you are in your writing journey. We can wobble together!