I've you've been hanging around the blog for a while, then you'll know that I love comparing writing to participating in a sport. In my particular case, that sport is horseback riding, specifically dressage, but it can apply to any physical endeavor that requires practice, dedication, attention to detail, and which requires you to learn, grow, and stretch yourself over time. Your imagination may be this spinning sphere of untapped magic in your brain, but your brain itself is a muscle, and it requires pushing if you want to become a stronger writer.
Every book in this photo (Fortunes of War is just a corner down in the bottom) represents a push. A stretch of some sort; trying something I've never tried before in a novel. I like to think every novel's been a stretch, and in many ways, they have been, but my '22, '23, and now '24 releases have been very active exercises in playing around with mental muscles I was too cautious to touch before. I've been very actively engaging with more subtle, nuanced forms of literary expression: leaving old crutches on the cutting room floor, and knowing better when to hold, and when to twirl. I can look back at Fearless, and then look at College Town, and I can see that in Fearless I was in a big, swinging working trot, and in College Town I piaffed all the way through. That's dressage-speak for saying I've really stepped up scene-setting in the most effective way possible in the intervening eight years.
One of my personal mantras is: I don't like to suck at things. If I'm going to do something, I want to do it well, and I want to continue to get better as I go along. Not because improving my craft will help me be more successful - it won't; I've come to terms with that - but because there is such joy in improving. In gaining new skills. In being able to chart your progress. As much as I love the sport of dressage, I hated showing, mostly because I had the dry heaves for twelve hours straight and then almost passed out when I finally got out of the saddle; stupid nerves. But also because I didn't need that sort of recognition. I derive immense satisfaction out of gaining new knowledge and witnessing my own improvement.
For all that College Town is a small book, it's one that's the direct result of stretching, and pushing, and learning, and practicing over the past decade plus, and for that reason it's a wonderful bright spot (for me) in my writing career to date. In fact, each book in this photo is very special to me for different reasons. They're all so different, and writing each one enabled me to write the next, and the next.
Thanks for coming along on this journey with me. I would write no matter what, but I'm glad I get to share it with you all 💕
Here's where I drop the obligatory College Town links:
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