Thursday, November 11, 2010

Why Do We Bother?





This month I'm participating in Nanowrimo and am spending every available minute I have thinking about or writing my book.  When I think about the amount of time that goes into writing a book, it can get a little depressing.  Especially since I watched my daughter read a long book in three days this week.  All I could think about was how long it took the author to write the first draft, then to edit it, then edit it again, and that says nothing about the publishing process of querying, finding a publisher, copy edits, marketing, and everything else that goes with it.  I began to think to myself, why bother spending all this time when people will just read it in three or four days and be done with it?

Then I heard my daughter laugh next to me in the car as she read her book on the way to school.  The way her eyes lit up at certain parts.  The way she kept telling me that she couldn't wait until I read it too, so she could share her favorite parts.  It filled my heart with joy to see her loving to read this book.  It wasn't a book that I had written but I could suddenly picture people like her reading and enjoying a book of mine and suddenly all the work seemed worth it!

(BTW just had to share a link to the book that brought a smile to my daughter's face.  She loved the Percy Jackson series and this one promises to keep her attention just as much!)

4 comments:

  1. thanks! it's been a frustrating week, and I needed this to keep me working on that book, even if I'm not getting the time I need to write on it as much as I want! :)

    ReplyDelete
  2. My son loved the Percy Jackson series too. He's very anxious to read Rick's next books! Thanks for sharing! :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. if i look at it that way, it can be kind of discouraging. lots of things are like that - a good meal takes two or three times the amount of time to cook it as it does to eat it - and then it is gone. With a book, even if they finish it - it remains. They can read it again or pass it on. And one book can reach lots more people (hopefully) - so in the grand scheme I think its all worth it! thanks for the post.

    ReplyDelete
  4. We are a home of Percy Jackson fanatics! My boys/husband/me love them.

    A good book is priceless, therefore worth all of the effort the writer put into it.

    ReplyDelete

LinkWithin

Related Posts with Thumbnails