It’s not you. It’s me. Really. I swear it is.

Do you have a love/hate relationship with your book?

 

I have recently joined the Google+ craze.  Thanks to Laura Stanfill and her post about it, flipbacks, and socks.  I’m loving it!  As she mentioned, it’s definitely a place for writers to communicate and feel like part of a community. (You can find the link to my profile on the Author Links on the sidebar of my blog.)

Another important writing update from yours truly is the completion of my second draft of my current wip, Read Me Dead.  If you read my post about it on Thursday, you know I have a few test readers lined up for it.  And until further notice, I’m taking a break from it.  I recently posted a comment on The Pain of Resetting – Loving Your Novel…Even When It Hurts by Clay Morgan on Kristen Lamb’s blog.

Part of it reads:

I’m currently taking a break from the second draft of my work in progress. We’ve had issues. We have a love/hate relationship. By the time I get back to it, I hope we’ll be completely in love again, but we have to take some time apart to evaluate our relationship.

I posted this on Google+ last night.

It feels strange not working on my latest novel. Taking a break from it is bittersweet. I feel like I should be working on it, but on the other hand, I know we need a break to reevaluate our love/hate relationship.

I’ve had some amazing comments on it, such as :

I know that feeling. My novel and I have been off and on, but deep down, I still love the story.

…I’m reading through James Scott Bell’s book on Plot & Structure right now, and that helps. But, yes, when do I get back to the actual writing?

My answer was this : That’s the million dollar question. How long is a long enough break from a novel? I know I’m waiting to hear back from a few readers on mine, but do I continue to take a break from it when they get back to me? It’s difficult knowing when the right time is. I don’t want to take too long from it though. I’m afraid my love for it will wither.

How long is a long enough break?  Will, as I asked, the love wither?  Or will we come back to it completely happy and in love again?

I took a break from my first novel, The Double Dare Bridges.  I did 4 drafts of it before finally deciding to set it aside.  It still needs work.  I’ve yet to come back to it because I have a few other writing projects going on.

That’s another thing.  Do you start a new writing project while taking a break from your current novel or is it cheating?  Tamara Paulin has a fantastic article about that 10 reasons not to start a new writing project.  At first I thought, hey it’s hard not to write another project while waiting, but now, I’m seriously considering waiting to write a new novel until I finish, Read Me Dead.  That’s not to say I won’t outline and write short stories because after all, I still have a 100 word a day goal to meet.  I finished one short story and wrote out another one last night to keep the creative juices flowing, but the second story relates to a new series I’m working on next.  So, is it bad to start a new project while in the “taking a break” phase?  I guess it depends on who you are and how much you care about your current work in process.  I’m still trying to figure out what type of person I am.

I think taking a break is important.  But how long is too long?  What do you do in the meantime?  (I do have to proof my ebook, Piercing Through the Darkness, for paperback publishing, so I suppose I could work on that. ;))

I don’t want to lose interest in my novel because it’s one of my favorites, but I know I need to take a step back to re-evaluate why I’m in love with it and what I can do to make it better and more loveable.