Screw It, I'm Writing This Week

Sometimes you just have to say it.

If you are in Savannah on Thursday I will be doing two events. (The event in Nashville on Friday is sold out, sorry.) If you are in the Los Angeles area the following week, I will be doing three more events.

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Hi friends.

Greetings from New Orleans where it was cold enough we had to turn on the water last night so the pipes wouldn’t freeze. There was a gentle tinkling noise running all night long and I felt like I lived in the woods near some kind of stream instead of a new (but very old) house with heretofore untested plumbing. As I type this it is now finally 34 degrees, and I feel a small sense of triumph. I didn’t kill my new home. (Not tonight, anyway.)

When I woke up I finished the Mini 1000. I felt alive again, writing five days in a row. I invented three new young, female characters who just came out of nowhere, and it turned out I had a lot to say about them. Whenever a new one popped up I asked myself what they were wearing, what they did for a living, and also what city they lived in before New Orleans, where the novel is set. And that was enough to get a fire started.

Also a few chapter beginning and endings became better defined this week. They’re not always evident right away, but I don’t let that bother me. I’m just trying to make sure each chapter always has at least a tiny cliffhanger at the end, which will hopefully make the reader want to turn to the next chapter. So sometimes I’m simply cutting a moment shorter in one chapter and revealing what happened in the next. Keep things moving along, I tell myself all the time.

Anyway, I have not been able to make enough time for myself lately because of the house move (and more) so it was great to just say, “Screw it, I’m writing this week.” Sometimes you have to do that, give that week to yourself, because no one else will offer that time to you.

See, nobody was looking over my shoulder telling me to write—except for me. An important thing to know: Not everyone may care that we’re writing, or even like it. But we care. We like it.

So we have to look out for ourselves. And that means telling ourselves to write.

Hey, the 1000 WORDS book comes out in paperback today! It’s pretty good-looking. If you see it out in a bookstore will you take a pic and tag me on it?

In honor of the launch and also because it’s the beginning of the year, I’m doing a 20% discount on an annual subscription today and tomorrow. That’s $48 or $4 a month for all these letters. (I won’t do another discount again till my birthday in November!)

I don’t know what this year holds exactly for this newsletter. I’ll be writing this first draft of my new novel and posting about it and hopefully you’ll write alongside me. I’ll host #1000wordsofsummer here starting May 31. I’ll probably interview some more creative people. We will talk about craft and inspiration and how to stay motivated. And also continue to discuss all the great books we are reading.

Look, I’m not an instructor, and I don’t have a syllabus. I operate on instinct. Still, I think it might be fun to come along for the ride.

Stay warm out there,

Jami