The what and the why
I’ve had my head down, writing a series since the day before my birthday in 2006, when I sold the first three DEAD IS books on proposal. During that time, my agent also sold two stand-alone contemporary yas, one finished and one on proposal. After the first DEAD IS book was released, the publisher signed up for two more books in the series.
Fast forward to 2010 and I just turned in the last book in the series, DEAD IS NOT AN OPTION, which will be out in the spring of 2011. During that time, I wrote six books and will have had a total of seven novels released. I know that many writers have had periods of even greater productivity, but my husband and I also added twins to that equation. I’ve always had an exquisite sense of timing.
So the past few years have been busy, but now, suddenly, it is less so. It’s not like I have found an extra twenty-four hours in a day or anything, but I do not have a contracted manuscript, or a deadline, or any requirement to write. It’s just me and a blank page and I’m a little bit lost.
What do I do now? Ideas come fast and furiously, but as fast as they arrive, I tire of them. What would you do? I have written over fifty thousand words this summer, which would equal a nicely sized first draft. Unfortunately, those words belong to four separate novels and even more unfortunately, I’m still continuing to write two of those manuscripts at the same time.
Do I sound confused? I AM confused. I keep hoping that a little voice will kick in and say “THIS is the manuscript you should be writing.” Instead, my little voice inundates me with ideas, each one more tempting than the last.
Has this ever happened to you before? Can it work? I’ve worked on different stages of two manuscripts before. For example, a first draft of one and copy-edits on another, but never two first drafts at the same time. How do you decide what manuscript to work on when?