Time for our monthly meeting of the Insecure Writer's Support Group! Hosted as ever by Alex J. Cavanaugh, the aim of the group is to offer a safe space where writers can share doubts and insecurities without fear of being judged. This month's co-hosts are J Lenni Dorner, Victoria Marie Lees and Sandra Cox.
This month's optional IWSG question is: Many writers have written about the experience of rereading their work years later. Have you reread any of your early works? What was that experience like for you?
I fear this question will show up how disorganised I am. My earliest work is many laptops and computers ago, and I've never been very good at backing stuff up (still not, although it helps that nowadays the process is largely automated). So unless I did some deep digging into ancient emails I don't even have my old work to go over and laugh about. If I did, I'm sure it would feel like reading someone else's work. I do remember the tone of those books, and my style has evolved vastly (thankfully) and it's a completely different genre than what I now focus on. A lot of crime/thriller stuff as I read a lot of those sort of books at the time, but I realised it's not my forte.
As for the present day, I'm still sketching out my parallel universe-based WIP, and "sketching" is a good way to describe it as I've been jumping about in the story, leaving placeholders and making broad brushstrokes, with a lot of stuff taking place in different universes and metapysical realms. This is definitely different to how I used to write early on as I would edit at the same time as writing and do a lot of work on scenes before moving on. I'm less precious about that stuff now and I'm fine about just getting down vague impressions that can be improved on later. Apart from that, I've recruited some beta readers for my previously completed book and anxiously awaiting their feedback while trying not to suffer imposter syndrome from critiquing their wonderful work.
Of course, as ever you can find other entrants to the IWSG at the sign-up list. Have you read back over your early work?
15 comments:
It's interesting how you're trying a different approach to writing your current manuscript. I hope your beta readers have helpful suggestions.
I wrote everything by hand until my second book so I still have some of that really old stuff. Not going to read it though.
I've always edited as I went, always moving forward, so sketching would be new to me. Hope it really helps when you flesh out the story.
You know, I'm pretty good about backing up my stuff, but a few years ago, my son let a hacker on our network and my computer was corrupted. All of it. I lost 5 years of work. I still can't go back to the OLD manuscripts without crying and giving up.
I feel sad that all your work is gone. That said, a lot of mine is on paper, in a trunk in my basement, way back with the spiders, so I never read it! It might as well be gone.
Do you have any stuff from way back? I have stuff that I wrote years before there were even calculators available to me, no computers, no word processors. I have one hand written in pencil. I had written a script for when the cast of Star Trek stumbled onto the set for Gunsmoke. You have Captain James T. Kirk hitting on Miss Kitty (Amanda Blake).
I like the fact that you can jump back and forth in your writing. If I hit a stumbling block, I come to a screeching halt, no backwards or forwards:( Have a creative day.
I've lost some of my early work, but most of the earliest stuff dates back to the the typewriter days, and I'm a total packrat about that stuff, so it's around. I'm not wild about reading old work but sometimes it's interesting, and sometimes it's necessary. I prefer not to look back at published work, since I really don't want to go down the rabbit hole of re-editing old novels.
I'm not there yet in terms of broad strokes then details. I can do that with art but not with writing. 😔...yet
Nick, you are amazing in the worlds you create. I got dizzy just reading how you are working on your alternate worlds story presently. Yes, I sometimes place markers or notes that need to be enhanced and revised when I get back to them. There's nothing wrong with this method, I think. The thing is to get the story out of you and onto paper [computer] first and then go back and revise later. All the luck with your current work in progress. You can do it!
Probably better to let the early stuff go, then. If you really want it, you really have to want it, I guess.
I find sharing a cloud account with a friend helps keep things in one place.
"A good book gets better at the second reading. A great book at the third." — Tyler DeVries
J (he/him 👨🏽 or 🧑🏽 they/them) @JLenniDorner ~ Speculative Fiction & Reference Author and Co-host of the April Blogging #AtoZChallenge international blog hop
If I read back over my early works, most of it unpublished, I'd probably really get turned off by it. That's why I normally don't make an to reread it! Lol.
I apologise, but I'm a little behind on looking over your book. Ill give you an update at my personal email by this evening.
It's refreshing to hear someone admit to being unorganized! LOL. I nurse the intention to be organized, but it doesn't always pan out that way. We must be on the same wavelength, Nick, because you're one of the few I've read so far who has said they would prefer not to reread earlier works!
I don't believe in disorganization, I believe there are levels of organization and, some people, have a way of organizing that catered specifically to them. Not rereading work can be great way not to look back or move back, it's not for everyone. I do it, but I do it because it helps me. If it wasn't helpful, not sure I'd bother.
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