And I'm Back

And so ends the grand experiment. Anybody make it to the end with me? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller?

Regardless of the answer (which I'm going to guess is pretty much nobody except maybe Becky) I'm declaring victory. I had only written 40 pages over the previous 4 and a half years and this process did indeed give me the push I needed to write another 60-plus pages and, most importantly, finish the damn thing. Regardless of whether it's any good or not (and my honest appraisal is that it's both) at least it's finally finished. Ever since I had this idea 5 years ago and had my wife and friends telling me that I definitely needed to write it and not let it be one of those ideas that I just don't do anything with, this whole project has hung over my head like the Sword of Damocles. Every time I was sitting around with free time there was this ever-present voice in the back of my head constantly saying "you know, instead of just sitting here you really should be working on your story." To which I would Homerically respond "Shut up brain or I'll stab you with a q-tip!" But now that little nagging voice has been silenced. Final tally, after I tweaked a bit more and added a title page, is 101 pages in Word. I really have no idea what that translates into as far as an actual published book goes (since those are obviously not 8.5 by 11) but I'd guess about 120-130 pages. Using this definition, at 21,983 words I fit squarely into the "novella" category, so from this point forward we're going to go with that.

In any case, if anybody did in fact make it all the way from beginning to end I would love to hear your thoughts! Not so much in the grammatical areas (i.e. all the typos and punctuation that I no doubt screwed up), but more from an overall story perspective. I'm interested to know which parts dragged and which parts felt rushed, if the overall narrative made sense (in as much as a superhero/supervillain story ever does) and wasn't confusing, where the humor was good and where it fell flat, and finally (and most importantly) if it was entertaining. I welcome any and all criticism because (even though I certainly also welcome praise) that's ultimately what will be most helpful to me going forward. As should be apparent, I am under no illusions that I wrote a masterpiece, so please let 'er rip!

So now of course the operative question is "what now?". And that applies on a couple different levels. What do I do with this completed novella? Christy, of course, thinks I should start submitting it to publishers. God bless her supportive little head, but I am not so deluded to think that it really has much of a chance. Frankly I think I'd be lucky if I could get a publisher to read it all the way through before rejecting it. Really, I try and see the finished product for what it is: a really valuable learning experience and a good first effort. Ultimately, if sometime in the next year or two our finances allow it, I will probably end-up self-publishing a really small run of 10 copies or so (which will cost about $300 if I do a hardcover) just so that I have something to throw up on my bookshelf as a conversation piece.

The next "what now?" pertains to my next big writing endeavor, and frankly right now I have no idea what that will be. I have a couple of different ideas bubbling around inside my head, but nothing that's really formed enough so far to get me excited. I definitely want to start again on something pretty soon. I really felt like I picked up steam as I went along and I'd hate to completely lose that momentum.

And finally, the last "what now?" has to do with this, my beloved blog. Again, I have no idea. I really have only been passively paying attention to politics (in fact I even just let my Economist subscription expire) but I imagine that will start to change in the next 6 months as we really start to ramp up into the 2012 election. Until then, I will probably go back to my semi-regular (but hopefully more regular) updates of randomness and inanity.