The Horror of the Blank Page

And why you have to face it down, anyway.

Photo by Anomaly on Unsplash

Yesterday, I started another draft of my novel.

I’ve been working on this project for the last year and a half, having amassed somewhere around 200,000 words on the project now — that includes drafting, notes, character profiles, character playlists. Basically, any of the written words about this story or these characters.

(I’ve come to learn and accept that this, at least for now, is what my process is like. Even if isn’t the fastest. But that’s another bitch for another time.)

But, even with all of that, there’s something to be said about starting a new draft. All of that is the sketchbook. But, now, you’ve set up the easel, stretched the new canvas, and you’re staring down the blank space.

And you’re scared shitless that you’re going to screw the whole thing up. You’re transfixed. Excited at starting the sketch, the color, the whatever — but you’re too afraid to take that first step. (You can really tell that I’m not a fine artist, right?)

The fear seems so normal.

It strikes me that a good author would have finished a first draft of this novel, somewhere around 15 months ago. By now, someone better would have had it into their agent and out on submission, if not outright…