Yes. I'm in a bit of a quandary. I've basically finished Only The Lonely and hope to publish it soon. The quandary is: what do I work on next. Maybe you can help me decide.
I've got perhaps 80-85% of a sequel to Only The Lonely already written called Battlefields of Love. My crude estimation is that I can finish it in 3-6 months, maybe even closer to 3 months. In some ways I think it's a better book than OTL. It will be about the same length, 75-80 thousand words.
I've got another novel that I wrote maybe 8-10 years ago that is probably 99% complete called The Sendoff. It has nothing to do with the OTL saga I have planned. I crudely estimate finishing it in 1-2 months. In some ways, I think it's the best book I've ever written, but it's from when I was first transistioning from literary writing to a more popular vein of writing. And it's somewhat, though not entirely, different from OTL. It's probably a bit shorter than 75,000 words, more like 50-60 thousand.
So, there's my quandary. Which do I work on next? Which one would you work on?
8 comments:
Work on the sequel to OTL. The other book has waited years. A little more time is nothing.
Yeah, go with the sequel. You'll draw in more readers.
I'd go with the sequel, too.
Of course, it's up to you. Follow your gut. Nothing is harder than writing something you can't get into. Go where your heart leads you.
Hi Richard. Would it not break your flow if you started on something completelydifferent. You could lose some valueble thoughts me thinks.
thanks for visiting my blog today. I left a reply which i wanted to email to you but couldn't get an addy. perhaps you can check it out.
IMHO, I would wait until the first in the series gets picked up before you start working on the sequel. Why? When I started writing the sequel and my first book got picked up, well, my publisher made me make a lot of changes that effected the second book. I ended up starting over. So I would work on something new... or in your case, the older book. Just a thought...
Oh you know me, work on what's calling out to you. Always. That's how magic works.
When I think about what I want to work on I always think:
If the world ended tomorrow, which novel would I rather have finished?
Lol! Works for me usually!
I'm loving your answers. Of course, I'm still in a quandary.
@Michael, Alex, Emily, Wendy (BTW, my book OTL has characters named Alex and Emily in it) working on the sequel does seem the natural thing to do. It's just that I'm in such a hurry to get two or three books published, as the more book you have, the better your chances of readers finding you. I guess that's kind of selfish.
@Clarissa. No problem there, as I'm the publisher. If I were going for traditional publication, you'd be right on.
@Tanya, Kamille, Emily My heart really is calling me in one direction. And that's probably what I'd be happiest with doing.
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