I’m sitting here writing this novel. The bones of it took me 7 days. Honestly, it felt a bit like that song by Craig David, except it was “I wrote this book on Monday, wrote it with a drink on tuesday, I was in love with it by wednesday, and on thursday, friday and saturday…. I chilled on sunday”.

Then it got shelved as life took over and oh jeez I don’t know, new shoes, new boy or new look caught my attention. It happens.

But a little while ago it came back into my life and it started growing arms and legs, got it’s own twitter account (not true) and grew in size (true).

In my life I HAVE to be passionate about what I do. It’s always been the way I work. I am completely fickle and will drop shoes, boys and clothes, (ooh that sounds wrong) if I’m bored by them.

But this book is under my skin and I believe in it. So while it’s strange I’m still passionate about it, I am surprised that I choose to do other things than finish it.

Is this a new lazy phrase I am going through?

Or is the thought of the success that will come with its final word added SCARIER than the thought of not finishing it? Oh hold on that doesn’t make sense. Surely finishing a novel you work really hard on, submitting it to a publisher is the obvious, coveted next step? Why hold back?

But actually this is a reeeeeeeeeeeeeally, no hold on you have to understand this, reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeally, reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeally scary part.

If the novel is finished, it’s finished. You can no more procrastinate on twitter saying you are writing a book, you cannot act mysterious at soirees (yes I go to some soirees) saying you’re a struggling author, you can no longer chat with other authors about the woes of writing. Now you have to produce the goods.

The published book. The success, the fast cars, parties for your friends with naked girls in hottubs, oh wait, no, naked guys in hot tubs, no wait, no-one naked in a hot tub, but maybe some people mooching around your garden drinking Pimms in shorts and t-shirts with slogans like, ‘Say neigh to ketamine’ or whatever it is you think of when you think of success. Obviously that’s not my thoughts, *nervous laugh*

But I am going to ‘fess up to the fact that the finished product, ‘The Book’ all done and dusted, typed up, double spaced ready and waiting to be sent off IS scary.

Sometimes scarier than the thought of no WiFi!

and so while I ponder this theory that I procrastinate for the reason success is scary, and obviously while there IS WiFi, I should make the most of it, shouldn’t I? *googles hot tubs*

xx