Book 3 Progress Report

February 20, 2018

Hi all. It’s been a while, right? I figured it was time to finally give you that update I promised two posts ago, which was, er, in August 2017. You deserve an update about my progress on Book 3.

The long and the short: there hasn’t been much. Progress, that is. So this is going to double as an explanation (exploration) of why (what happened). But before that: I have not given up on writing the next Firesign book, nor on writing novels in general. I want to say that upfront because a year of sporadic communication, with little to show for it, could certainly give that impression. So once again: I have not given up. The book will come out eventually.

I’ve just learned a lot about what not to do if I truly want to be an author.

The reason I haven’t made much progress is because of my day job. You see, I have this problem: I don’t do shallow well. I go all in or not at all. That’s why my hobbies tend to turn into jobs. I’m into anime? I become an anime blogger. I love fantasy stories? Soon I’m a fantasy novelist. I enjoy craft beer? That’s how I became a sales rep for a craft brewery, and that’s where the problem began.

At first there wasn’t enough work for me to be full-time, so I had to have another job on the side. I got a few posts out of that, but though I learned lessons about work and myself, it didn’t result in much writing. I spent three-quarters of a year without so much as an outline for Book 3, because I was constantly working, and because it turns out that screwing with your sleep is a great way to maximize misery. Who knew?

(Side note: that book, How to Be Miserable: 40 Strategies You Already Use, is great. Highly suggested. Affiliate link.)

Eventually I did become full-time and quit the other job, but now I had a problem: I was sales rep in a part of the state I didn’t live in. A part of the state that’s two hours away. A part where the cost of living is more expensive than where I live, and to which—considering how I worked for a brand new, largely untested brewery—I wasn’t willing to move to (and inflate my rent) because there was a decent chance all this wouldn’t work out. So I didn’t, and I stayed with friends 2-4 nights a week while I was working instead. Days I usually worked for 10+ hours, because I had to give my salary’s worth.

All of which would have been problem enough, and then there’s this: it’s really hard to write fiction at a friend’s kitchen table. At least for me. I write by setting up a designated writing area and then wrapping it in barriers until nothing can get in to bother me, whether that be people or distractions. In someone else’s home, I can’t do that. Out in a common area, I can’t do that. I was at other’s mercy, and I couldn’t impose on them any more than I already was. So still nothing got done.

I still tried to barrel through anyway. I wasn’t writing, which is the one blasted thing I want to do in this world, but I thought that if I could just be successful enough at this, I could ride the brewery’s growth to a marketing or management position I would enjoy. A good job at a craft brewery to fund my writing? What could be sweeter?

I’m a stubborn guy. Sometimes it takes me a while to realize that I’m banging my head against a wall. It took a while for this one, but eventually I got it. Eventually I realized that it would take too long for the brewery to need this hypothetical position, and in the meantime a year and a half had passed without a book. I realized I wasn’t enjoying my day job, and I wasn’t even making enough money for it to be worth it. I realized that I would probably never get to the job I wanted anyway, because I wasn’t sure the owners would ever give up enough control to let me do the kind of work I was good at doing.

So I don’t work there anymore.

All of which is a long, convoluted way of saying that I haven’t made any progress on Book 3, but that’s about to change. This experience has taught me what kind of job I need to have in order to write novels, and while I’m not there yet, I’ll be working to get there as soon as possible. In the meantime I’m not traveling all the time anymore, so I’ll have more time to write.

Which is a relief. Writing fiction hasn’t been a consistent part of my life for the last year and a half, and it’s sucked. I don’t want to be in this position again, so I’ll do my best to avoid it. Which will hopefully lead to more books for you as well.

So once again, sorry for the radio silence, and sorry for the delay on Book 3. I hate not being able to live up to my own ideals and release a book in a timely manner, but we don’t live in a world that’s kind to authors. I unwittingly set up my life to be pretty good for writing for a while there, but not for the past couple of years. I’ll do better going forward.

Though if anyone wants to become my rich mysterious patron, drop me a line. I promise to add you as a suitably dashing and/or enchanting character in my books. You know, something tasteful. I’ll only have your character rescue the protagonists every other adventure. Wouldn’t want to go overboard.