A new novel on the go

Busy few weeks just recently, and starting to panic that it is only FIVE WEEKS TO CHRISTMAS! Heck! How did that spring out at me, all unpredictable like?

Last month I had an idea for a new novel, and started making notes. Knocked out the first 3,000 words in an effort to be ready for my turn in my online writing group's critique circle.

Then started to get cold feet. After the initial excitement, I couldn't work up much enthusiasm for the story. When I read it back to myself, it seemed that the characters might be too remote and distant from everyday experience for readers to identify with them, and what was happening in the opening scenes just didn't seem as interesting as I first thought.

I wonder how common is that kind of self-doubt in the early stages of a project?

But I finished that section off and submitted it anyway, and have got an overwhelming positive response back. And, no, people in this group are not afraid to say if they don't like something, which gives me new hope and renewed energy to tackle the uphill battle of knocking this sucker into shape.

I think that after the euphoria of completing one novel, something that I never dreamed I'd be able to hold my head up and say, I'd forgotten how much hard graft and uncertainty went into it during the actual writing process. Now I'm back at the foothills of that same mountain and the memories are flooding back. Another long road ahead! And I think I just needed some hint that I was not setting off down a dead end.

But I've had such fabulous encouragement that, darn it, I guess I've got to crack on with it now!