Julie’s post Saturday was timely because I’d just sent a version of today’s blog to the Plotmonkeys in an email. I sent it at 2 AM one morning while unable to sleep, up struggling with the fact that once again for the hundredth time in less than 200 pages, I had to go back, insert big chunks of information, add things to my story and then ask Janelle, my critique partner, to read (or should I say reread) yet again. 
I came to quite a few realizations that night.
~ I spend a lot of time feeling GUILTY that I write, and get blocked, write and read, then find myself unable to write straight through.
~ That everyone around me seems to know how to write a book and plot and I can’t. This is true. I can’t do it in a straight line, the way most people do it. ~ And that night, when I woke up, I realized I was EXCITED – about going in and doing all the fixes I have to do to make this sucker work and trust me, it ain’t simple. Now Janelle always says (after I apologize that she has to read my whole book for the hundredth time b/c of new things added) that it’s how I write, she’s used to it. But it’s usually in a me complaining, why can’t I get this right like YOU do on the first shot? And then I realized – I JUST CAN’T.
Now if I could get rid of the guilt b/c it always means asking Janelle for another read, I’d be in even better shape. NOT that you ever make me feel guilty, Janelle. That’s the Jewish Girl in me. 
OK I know, I should have accepted this ages ago. But I simply CAN’T. But it gets worse … I get this euphoric high from going in an doing these revisions and adding pages. 
The same euphoric high from the start of a new book (that quickly ends when I fizzle and have to go back in and get MAD at myself). :cursing:
Do you think I am finally coming to terms with my process? I can’t do it the first time. I’ve tried outlining from beginning to end – in the start of my career – and I’ve tried storyboarding so I can’t screw up – and you name it, I’ve tried it. And now I realize it’s not just that I can’t, but I LIKE my process (::ducking::) I don’t like avoiding writing b/c I can’t figure out what’s wrong, but I think again that is part of my process BUT when I wrote this, I couldn’t wait to dig into the story and add what it needs.
Now I’m at my typical transition point when I get blocked again except I don’t have the time to allow myself to stop. 
And this is the story of my writing life. For what it’s worth.
Carly Phillips would like to take 100% credit for all her stories but the truth is, Carly’s strength is writing family, emotion, funky elderly people and animals. She couldn’t plot her way out of a paper bag, which is why she smartly found her plotmonkey pals early on in her writing career. Thanks to their support, Carly is now a NYT Bestselling author of 23 plus novels. Because writing doesn’t keep her busy enough, Carly is also a wife, a mother of one preteen and one teenage daughter, the primary care giver of her soft coated Wheaten terrier and an expert carpool mom.
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Hey Carly, that’s just how you are, and it obviously working, and you enjoy it, so it’s all good. The end result is the same – a book. And for a reader, I love that! I don’t believe there’s one “right” way for everyone about anything anyway. That would be pretty boring. Plus, I don’t think Janelle minds too much. You guys help each out in different ways – that’s just how your critiquing works.
Thanx for sharing Carly. Love hearing this stuff :)
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Carly, I am fighting this same fight right now. I have precisely the same process, no matter how many times I say “this is the one I’m going through to the end” and then revising/rewriting (also my favorite part of writing)…but I can’t. I simply can’t move on until it’s right…or right enough. But here’s what I’m learning – my gut is loud and it will tell me when it’s “right enough” to move on. There is an indescribable sensation of “rightness” when I close the document for the day and I’ve done the right thing for my story or characters. I either have it…or I wake up in the middle of the night with that white hot spurt of terror in my stomach. The thing I’m learning is to listen to my gut. If I ignore it, and power on anyway, then I’m just going to have to completely rewrite anyway.
Great post!
Rocki
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Thanks, guys! Just so you know I’m headed into NYC to meet with my agent today so if I don’t chat back until tonight, that’s why!
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Carly and Roxanne – thanks so much for making a newbie feel better. I don’t really have a critique partner – I have a best friend (my person) who I beg to read my chapters after I get them finished. Then I end up doing like I did yesterday and e-mailing her and saying, “Trash that last chapter – I just re-read it and it stinks.” Or then I think of a major point I left out in one of the beginning chapters and I go back and add a big chunk and ask her to re-read it to make sure it sounds OK. I feel very guilty for asking her to read and re-read so many times.
I got my science fair project board yesterday and am working on my “scene” note cards, pictures, etc. that will hopefully help keep me on track. But if I get derailed, thanks for letting me know that’s OK too.
Hope you have a great meeting with your agent!
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YOU ARE SO NOT ALONE! This is very similar to my process. I am never done until I’m done. It’s constant revision, adding chunks, and I get extremely excited the closer it get to IT, a real book, one that flows. When I’m in it, I hate it. I hate myself. I hate the way everybody around me seems to think of such brilliant things to say while I struggle for even a spark of something decent. What’s funny, is this hasn’t always been my process. In the beginning, I could write straight through, perfecting each chapter as I went, and when I finished, I was finished. Not so anymore. What’s funny, though, is that I think I write better books now. So maybe this process of ours isn’t such a bad thing. When it’s all said and done, it’s all been said and done. And I like it. Right now, however, I’m bleeding page after page. So hang in there, sistah!
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Roxanne and Kimberly – do you guys have critique partners like Carly – someone that you seem to make bleed page after page with you
– or do you pretty much just figure it all out yourselves?
I ask because I think I could handle this whole insert/change/delete/add back last deletion if I wasn’t inconveniencing someone else too. But I don’t trust myself to be the only one looking at it to find everything.
Thanks to all of you for your insight….:bowdown:
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But Carly,
No matter how you get – we love the finished product. Janelle still loves you and we haven’t heard her complaining (out loud at least). Your way works – go with it.
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Jodie,
I have a critique partner who reads when I need her to (Nina Bangs). We don’t bother each other too often because she’s as busy as I am. When we both started out, we were unpublished and read and re-read EVERYTHING. Now, the dynamics of our partnership have changed from reading to commiserating on business issues, etc. Anyhow, for me it’s a figure it out as I go along thing. I trust myself on some things (characterization, emotion), but I often miss minor details and plot elements. I just read and re-read and then my editor usually catches anything questionable. I do, however, try to send in extremely clean copy, so usually it’s me all by my lonesome. Whaaaaa! Okay, enough wailing. Back to flaying myself and bleeding . . .
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Ahh yes. The lovely CP who seems to be an endless well of patience. Mine–the ever talented Leeanne Kenedy–is probably going to end up getting dedicated on every book I write because I don’t know how I finish them without her, or why she doesn’t complain about my neurosis. My favorite phrase is, “She talks me down from the ledge”.
As far as process…when I get one, I’ll let you know.
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Jodie — I don’t have a cp now, although I did early on. Now, I write for my editor. I know what she likes, I know what she hates and I think of her (and her pencil!) as I work. I loved what Kimberly said about the process changing as you write more books. I definitely had an easier time of it in my first 10 or 12 manuscripts – I used that science project plot board like a bible. I’m on # 20 now, and the process has changed and, in some ways, gotten much harder. I almost think I *know* too much and I work less organically than I used to. But the books are definitely better, richer, more complex. (I mean, *I* think so!!) Like Kimberly, I bleed on every page. But, for the first time in about five books, I’ve got the science project board out again. Like children, each book has a personality (and set of challenges) all its own.
Carly, have fun in NY!
xoxo
Rocki
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I totally agree with Barbara Jo. Obviously, I am NOT a writer. It sounds like the writing profession is like any other (I am such a perfectionist, that it is horrible, except for when it comes to the messes of my boys….thus, I have white walls in my house and nothing up!). Maybe I missed the point of the blog…
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Katie, no you didn’t miss the point. Writing *is* like any other profession that is artistic, meaning there are different ways for every artist to approach their craft. Sort of like how different women have different techniques toward housekeeping…since some of us have no technique at all! :happy2:
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Jodie, I have my best friend read my chapters as I go along also. Your first post sounds amazingly familiar. I email her a chapter and then send another telling her to delete it because its not right. I was wondering how everyone found their critique partner? I would really like to have someone to discuss things with that understands what I am going through. Any suggestions where to find one?
Carly hope you have a great meeting.:cheer:
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Oh, Carly, congrats on discovering your process! Even if it’s just figuring out that you don’t really have one!
I, like you, Rocki & Kim, am the same way. I have tried so many different ways but it always comes back to, really, “trial and error.” I write something, then as I move forward I figure out ways to make it better, or I realize I should have done something different, or I decide I want to add a new element to the story, and I go back and add/rewrite/smooth/revise. Even remove!
So
to you on giving yourself a break and acknowledging that what works for you is what you need to do! And 
to Janelle for helping you by reading as much as you need her to!
PS: Have fun in NYC!
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I’ve been critiquing with Carly for over 6 years now, and I’m so used to her way of writing — and the fact that she LOVES doing revisions because it adds pages to her manuscript and when she’s doing revisions she’s at least going forward with her story in some way.
But while Carly panics throughout her book that she doesn’t have a story or plot (which we work through, and obviously she DOES have a story because you all read it when it comes out in print, LOL!), I, on the other hand, panic at the very end of my book. Carly’s used to hearing “Oh my God, what happened to my story? My story fell apart somewhere along the way! What’s the black moment? What’s the resolution between the characters and their conflict? Oh my God, I have NO story!”
And that’s when she calmly tells me to “SNAP OUT OF IT!” :happy2:
Then we talk the ending through, and she brilliantly helps me pull together all those loose threads in a way that I know I couldn’t do without her help. Beginnings and through the middle is her weakness — pulling together the endings are mine.
Kim — I think we can all commiserate on the “bleeding” thing. With each book I write, it gets more and more difficult to put “brilliant” words on the page. Carly and I are always certain that our stories are boring, they have no spark, they lack oomph — and we whine about it to one another all the time. Then I’ll read her stuff, and she’ll read mine, and it’s truly ALL THERE. This is what we lovingly call “being a WEENIE”.
You’d think with each book we write, and no matter what process we use, it would get EASIER, not HARDER!!! :doh:
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Great post Carly! I’m still not sure what my writing method is. Sometimes I can plot it out, which usually changes, and sometimes it’s totally pantser style. I’m trying Julie’s “Plotting with Your Pants On” style now and it’s helping (I think):thumbsup2:. I do know that I have to make each chapter the best I feel it can be before going on. That’s not to say that I don’t write forward because I do. I just end up coming back to the chapter that is not where I want it to be to go over it yet again.
Patti L and Jodie – when you delete scenes are you putting them in a deleted scene file in case you need to come back to them at some point or insert them somewhere else? The only reason I asked is because early on I did not do this only to find in chapter five I could have used one of the scenes that I had deleted in chapter one. Since I hadn’t saved it I had to rewrite it and still think I left out some key things from the original.
I also owe my cp huge amounts of thanks, praise, and Venti Mocha’s from Starbucks (her favorite). I’m not sure what I would do without her. She reads and rereads for me. I do the same for her but I always feel guilty about asking her to reread a chapter that she just read two days prior.
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Hi Carly and Welcome back Rocki,
I recently read “Take me Tonight” I started reading your books after you
.were a guest here at Plotmonkeys.I am enjoying the Bullet Catchers.
I think each one just gets better. “Take me Tonight” was, oh so good.
Carly,
You are a terrific writer. What ever gets it done for you is fine with me.
I wait patiently for each new release.
:love2::kiss::love2::kiss::love2:
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Now Carly I am always available for a test read if Janelle isn’t around. Just think of the torture I can incur on other readers. :evil::twisted:
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Carly, whatever process you use you should keep using. Your books are awesome and we all appreciate all your hard work!!! I love that I’m learning so much about the writing process from everyone(good ideas if I ever try to write a book).
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Thank you all for sharing your writing woes – I feel better knowing I’m not alone in my writing insecurites. And to hear it from published authors who I love and respect makes me feel like maybe there is hope for me.
I don’t have a critiquing partner and write all the way through without looking back (most of the time – I will occasionally go back to look up a detail). I think I read somewhere that it’s good to just write and finish your book and then go back and rewrite. That seems to have worked for me so far. I’m fairly new at this and my first two manuscripts were relatively painless. My third one however is, like many of you said, making me bleed, and Janelle, I appreciated knowing you often find it harder rather than easier to write, given your incredible book list!
Carly, no matter what you write (and the rest of the Plot Monkeys too) I am a fan and will read book after book of yours.
Thanks everyone for making a newbie feel part of the group and giving me confirmation that my feelings are normal.
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I love this post. I’m a newbie and still trying to figure out what my “process” is, but what Carly described sounds a lot like what I’ve been doing. And it’s very encouraging to know that it could work!
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Vicki – thanks for the great advise, and yes I do keep all of them. In fact, I probably should plant a forest to be a responsible citizen because I print out each chapter, make my changes to that – for some reason I can “see” it all better on paper – and then I reprint it. I’ve kept all my old changes in folders by chapter.
Patty L – I don’t know how good I’d be at critiquing since I don’t know what I’m doing in the first place but if you want, you can e-mail me and we can talk – I do make a good listener and sounding board.
jodiewilkerson@yahoo.com
Kimberly and Roxanne – thanks for your answers. Although between you guys, Carly and Janelle – I’m not feeling encouraged.:happy2:
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Carly & the other Plotmonkeys, thanks for sharing the journey of writing a book. Each struggle I read about makes me appreciate each of you more & more. Please keep writing. As an avid reader with no talent for writing please keep writing, I will appreciate each book I read more. :love2:
Carly I know you have already gone to New York but I hope you have a wonderful day. :)
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Another newbie here. Also trying to figure out process. Kicking self because I couldn’t “flow” like literary writers. Needed more structure, which makes sense since I’m an engineer and fairly analytical person. But then felt less inclined to write, like I’d already told the story. So I’m discovering that I need to both ebb (pull back and adopt some structure) as well as flow (sit down and let it rip).
I suspect that process changes over time, since some of my changes have been linked to learning more about writing.
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Jodie & Patty L: I’ve learned over the years of having a critique partner that you each will have your different strengths when it comes to writing, and those strengths will help you to give the other person your point of view of a situation or problem. There is no right or wrong when critiquing — just one person’s opinion on something. AT least, that’s the conclusion that Carly and I have come to — when I critique her stuff, it’s just MY OPINION when I make comments or suggestions, and sometimes those comments and suggestions work for her, and other times they don’t. And vice-versa. And neither one of us are ever offended when we disagree with a comment or suggestion. Bottom line — you have to go with your gut when it comes to changing something, or not changing it, if that makes sense!
In fact, there have been times when Carly and I have disagreed on an aspect of a story (hers or mine), that we just have to let the other person write the story THEIR WAY, and we take a step back on critiquing that particular story. It’s only happened a few times, but it DOES happen!
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Carly,
No matter how you get there the end result is always great. I, for one, will always be a fan for life. So what ever keeps you writing these wonderful and funny stories is a process that works.
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Carly,
I agree with Carol R and I too will be a fan for life:thankyou:
Your books are awesome and we all appreciate all your hard work!!! that goes for the other Plotmonkeys also.:thumbsup:
It is very interesting to read the posts to see what goes on and what is done to write a book and to see what you all go through.
Hope you had a great time in NY
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Carly:
You’re process is a process. It’s called “haphazard.”
I’m the same way. I tried to lay out the plot, but as I wrote the charcers kept changing the story on me.
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Hi, all. I had a great day in the city. Good talk with my agent, fun lunch and business talk, and just productive all around. Rocki, were your ears burning? your name came up!
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Wow Carly & Janelle, you are so lucky to have each other….I’m embarassed to say I’m jealous. Its hard enough to muddle through with the doubts and insecurities but if I had a Carly or Janelle to get me back on track…my world would be a better place.
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Karen, I feel your pain. *Hugs*. How lucky that you & Janelle have each other, using your different strengths, to polish & refine those stories. To the non-writer it would seem that after one has written for awhile, it would be easier. But, from all I read most all say this is not the case. Please know I appreciate all your hard work.
Patricia A.
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Carly, I have one word for you: DITTO. You and I write exactly the same way. I hope to God that when I get that book deal, they never ask me to do an outline because I wouldn’t even know where to START. I feel so much better now. I thought I was the only one.
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Celise, you’d be shocked by what you hav eto do at the beginning of your career. There are no “I can’ts” LOL!