Also, the issue of fun gets convoluted. I can have fun by doing what I want. But I can also have fun by being satisfied with my story, and making it the best it can be. It’s true they are different kinds of fun for me, but I think the rewards of a satisfying story outweight the… arbitrary muse.

My mind is always churning with odd thoughts that I like or want, so the fact I don’t let all of them into the story doesn’t seem so much like the crime against art that it’s painted to be.

Trust me on this. Sometimes what the writer wants is not what’s best for the story. Trust me I know. It took getting this close to getting a publisher interested in my story only to stay the beginning wasn’t strong enough…part of it cause I was too stubborn to change things.

I’ve always known I start novels off slow. I like lots of background and explanation. I’ve always put it at the beginning making things slow.

I’ve learned that there’s a compromise. I can still have that background, but I can space it out, put it in later…not all at the beginning and still make a story work.

The funny thing is…I find when I finally do what the novel needs, I really haven’t compromised too much and 95% of the time it’s actually much better than the original version.

And those times when I have to lose a character or sub-plot or even a scene I really like, I remind myself they’re not really ‘gone’. There’s always the next story where that character might find a home or that subplot might be just what the story needs.