Oh, Yeah, that Writing Thing

By Keith N Fisher

Garrison Keiler, on the Prairie Home Companion, usually starts his monologue with,

"Well, it's been a quiet week in Lake Wobegon, Minnesota, my hometown, out there on the edge of the prairie."

I like his writing and I especially like the feel of the radio show. Keiler tells it like it is, so be careful when you read some of his writing. Still, he is a national treasure.

When I started writing this post, I thought of Keiler’s signature start of the monologue and this post began, Well, it’s been a quiet week in the cyberspace of writing. I took a break from the world and began to analyze my life. I’m making needed changes and setting goals.

One of those decisions was to write for the national market. I will continue to write LDS fiction. At least until I exhaust all of the story outlines (and there are many) in my project file. I got my manuscript back from my cousin, (one of my beta readers). She knows who she is, and she did a wonderful job with Star Crossed. No, I won’t give you her name, because I don’t want you to steal her. It’s hard enough, to find proofreaders who have time these days and I need all the help I can get. She’s mine. J

I talked about this in a recent post, but have you ever contemplated the amount of time it takes to get a book published these days? It probably takes longer for me than most, because I just can’t get it perfect in the first draft. I was thinking how nice it would be to write well enough that I could submit my work as soon as I write the words, The end.

Better yet, wouldn’t it be great to have a publisher anticipating my next work? The old stop the presses Keith just sent his next book, cliché comes to mind. If I could just write, without taking time to edit, I could get through my project’s file in no time. If I didn’t have to work a day job, I could write all the time.

Of course if I were a best seller, I could hire an editor. I could write everything with the discovery method, turn it over to the editor, make the changes, and leave it with my secretary to shop the agents and publishers.

Writing is getting easier for me all the time. Waiting for Critique group edits takes time, but I wouldn’t make a move without them. Then, even after I make those recommended changes, I still need proofreaders. I need other eyes looking over the manuscript. Besides, hearing positive comments about the plot is good for my ego.

Like I said, I wrote about this process a couple of weeks ago, but I’m grateful to my cousin, even though I wish I could just write and not worry about the quality. I was writing posts for other blogs and thought; oh, yeah, I need to write the writing blog. That's how the name of this post came to be.

As Garrison Keiler says at the end of his monologue, "Well, that's the news from Lake Wobegon, where all the women are strong, all the men are good looking, and all the children are above average."

Good Luck with your writing—see you next week.