Stuggles and hardships as a young writer

This is officially the 3rd day of my blog. I made a promise to myself to post once a day and I've already broken it. The internet is down at home and so I am typing away in bits and pieces at work instead of doing what I am supposed to be doing. And that reminds me of when I first started writing after college.

One of the goals of this blog is to serve as a support group, confessional, marketing platform for novelists who are struggling to bring their dream into reality.To that end let me share some stories from my own struggle to finish my first novel, The Vagabond King.

After college I had a folder full of snippets for a novel I wanted to write. I had a phrase here, a character tag there, an idea for a single plot point but nothing comprehensive. I also had a lack of time. I was married shortly before I graduated and a father shortly after. Though I graduated with degrees in English and history I got a job driving a forklift in a factory for 12 hours each night. I was only getting about 2 hours of sleep a day because I had to watch my son while my wife worked. So, like I am doing right now, I would steal minutes from the day and string words into sentences for a later time when I could string sentences into paragraphs to be put aside for a still later time when I could string the paragraphs into pages only to realize that the writing sucked and had to be broken apart, revised, rewritten and then revised and rewritten yet again.

It took me years and 25 revisions but it was finally finished. So, if you have just embarked upon a writing career and feel like to are struggling through the dark night of the soul as you use a fork to pick through the prison walls that keep you from being the novelist you always dreamed, take heart. You are not alone.

This is not the first time this has ever happened it is just the first time it is happening to you. In the end you will be better for it and, more importantly, your novel will be as well. Let me leave you with one realization I came away with when I was lamenting my existence during those days. The obstacles in your life don't prevent you from becoming who you were really meant to be, they reveal who you truly are inside. Keep writing and best of luck.