7 reasons why I have to finish writing my novel

Posted by amanda
April 18, 2008

Ah, life. So many distractions, so many reasons not to finish writing my novel. From the lows of that quiz which told me it would take years for me to finish a novel to the highs of November when I actually completed a (really very terrible) draft of it for NaNoWriMo, there are some days I can practically see my novel on a bookshop shelf, and others when even finishing one more chapter seems like a Mount Everest level challenge.

But I just have to finish it. Why? That’s a good question, and one that’s definitely open to late-Friday-evening-philosophising:

  1. I have told the world I’m writing a novel. Can’t let “the world” down now, can I?
  2. I’ve promised myself I will write a novel. Letting myself down is even worse than letting the world down.
  3. Because I’ve started it. Shouldn’t you finish everything you’ve started? (Does that mean I should go and finish that bar of chocolate I started eating earlier this evening?)
  4. Writing a novel is something I think I’m capable of. Alone, that’s not a reason (I’m probably capable of learning how to code horridly complicated HTML too, but I’m not going to do it), but I feel a need to prove myself right.
  5. Mr Stockdale. He was my Grade 7 teacher and he believed I could do it. On the last day of school he came up to me and quite seriously told me he knew I’d write books, and he wanted a copy of the first one. Unfortunately, he passed away before I even graduated from high school, but I still think of that day.
  6. I will figure out exactly what my characters are doing and I’ll learn something from them. I’ve already learned curious things about human nature just by getting the first draft out and looking more closely at the first chapter. Really curious. Exactly what is still a secret.
  7. I might become slightly wealthy and slightly famous. More realistically, perhaps, I might be able to trade some of my not-so-favourite blogging jobs for equally paid novel writing.

That’s it. Enough blogging, I’ve got to get writing. I promise.

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I’ve been getting tonnes of good advice at the Network Blogging Tips blog recently and this post is actually an entry for their Make A List challenge.

Goals and Motivation, Writing Novels

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