Bernadette Benda

Summertime is the time to PARTY. (And by party I mean going to the mountains and finding somewhere quiet where you can finish your book.)

And speaking of parties…(I apologize to all the introverts. I realize talking about parties is illegal.)

Finishing your first draft can be very exciting. Whether it’s after 30 hysterically frantic days of Nanowrimo, or 4 slogging years of painstakingly typing a 200,000 word monster – You all deserve a little toss of confetti.

*tosses confetti and gets it blown right back into the face. because it’s sweltering outside and too many fans are blowing*

But how to CELEBRATE? Should you go out, buy a cake, light a candle, and make a wish? Set up a block party? Burn down a village and take residence in a nearby mountain full of gold?

Here are some ideas.

One of the golden rules of writing: That first draft won’t edit itself. 

Neither will the next book write itself. 

So roll up your sleeves (or roll them down if that makes you feel better) and get to work. Ain’t nobody got time to party. 

Buy a new notebook! Or two! Or three! Or twenty five! Or five hundred and become the emperor of notebooks and build a vault to keep them all in! 

Writers are such a cliche as they stare wide eyed at notebooks in store windows (I actually have never seen a notebook in a store window), or as they pick them up, feeling the flop of the pages and smelling scent of the cover.

If they could, writers would have soap that smell like books.

While we are talking about notebooks….buy a new book! Bookworms always need a new book, and writers are almost by definition bookworms.

Or if your pocket book is shrunken and you only have pennies and empty gum wrappers left in your wallet, go to the library. 

It’s all fun and games until everything is overdue, and you have too many fines that keep you from checking out more books until you turn yourself in and pay the librarians with a golden egg and harp.

You did it. You finished that first draft. And just like Frodo climbing up Mount Doom (and not throwing the Ring into the fire), you deserve a nice, luxurious nap. 

Go. Take it. Find yourself a spot and put a disturb at your peril sign on the door.

And if you really aren’t feeling any of these, you always have. One. Last. Option. 

SCREAM AND PANIC. Your novel just needs too much work, and there is nothing you can do but wreak havoc.

On a side note, *picks up sticky note from the side* I did some of my extreme dot-to-dots! (Yes, I am back from vacation. If I wasn’t, I wouldn’t be writing this.)

LOOK HOW SHINY THEY ARE.

That’s all folks! *takes off radio headset*

 

 

 

Header Photo by Corey Agopian on Unsplash