PicoWriMo

I find it very hard to keep writing when feeling discouraged about my output, and being self-critical & very thin-skinned that's a lot of the time, sadly. (This Yuletide has been sheer hell on that front.)

My first (original) novel, was frankly crap. I suppose I learnt to keep going. I also learnt you can't polish a turd.

I do wonder whether the Nano idea of just writing a novel's length of crap and then polishing it up is at all viable. I can't imagine it working for me, but others do seem to swear by it.

And at greater remove I can see that it was doomed because I wasn't really interested in the central story, so much as the bits on the side, i.e. that you should probably pick which of the multiple plot threads you like best and not have that as the D plot. I think I've got that sorted better this time round, and with plot-lines that I'm actually interested in have learned more about handling them.

First finish a novel, however terrible it turns out to be, then work out why it isn't very good, then write one that works... I might be finished by my nineties, if I'm very lucky...