Me on Writers Who Aren't Published Yet

because i am one, like a lot of you.

sometimes i feel left out in the writing community because i'm not published yet. i'm working away on my laptop in an attempt to write something interesting and different and exciting that will one day find me an agent, an editor, a publisher, and readers.

i love writers/authors who talk about what it was like when they were writing their first book, or their second (or in the case of me, my fourth), because it makes them sound human. it's nice to know they were once me, all full of hopes and dreams and novel ideas they hope aren't complete garbage.

i really hope mine isn't complete garbage.

a couple years ago, when i was hoping it would be easy to be a writer after i finished university, i was listening to The Writing Show with Paula B (http://www.writingshow.com/index.html). i will admit, i didn't listen to all of the episodes, but i listened to the 'Getting Published' series of episodes that featured Paula talking to someone who was writing something they hoped would find them an agent and get them published, especially the ones with Mark Leslie (http://www.markleslie.blogspot.com).

he's Canadian and he was working on a werewolf novel: my attention was totally grabbed.

i loved the episodes with Mark because he was writing while dealing with a day job and a family and all the other ways that life can get in the way of writing a novel.

i want more of this. i want more people trying to make it as a writer talking about how they're trying to make it as a writer. i want more acknowledgment to people who aren't there yet but want to be so much. i want to see more blogs by book reviewers and how-to-write people about the not-there-yets, the people who are writers but not published authors.

i'm still a writer, i'll always be a writer, even if it never works out. i hope it does, i really think the novel i'm working on will be a good one, but i'm still working on it. i'm barely halfway through my first draft.

this is for all the aspiring writers, because you're out there, working hard every day, writing as much as you can in the little gaps of time you're given.

and because you're out there, i want your thoughts.

i want you to talk about what it's like as an aspiring writer, unsigned, unpublished, and not yet ready to throw your novel into the giant slush pile that's out there waiting.

you could do at your own blog, or comment here, or talk about it on Twitter. whatever you prefer.

it would be an interesting thing to do as a podcast. hmmm. *pulling on my thinking hat*

now, i'm going to go write as much as i can for the next hour. it's almost time for bed.