Okay, I know I said I was going to talk about twists, but then… something came up.

Last weekend was WonderCon, and once again a few very talented folks (and me) came together to do the Writers Coffeehouse. If you’ve never been, it’s essentially a bunch of professional writers who are just there to answer your questions. That’s it. Anything goes—writing, publishing, feedback, publicity, editing, contracts, managing this whole hobby/ part-time job/ career/ whatever it is to you. You ask, we answer. Sometimes with a joke or two and the occasional segue.

Anyway, one question we were asked ended up getting, well, a strong emotional reaction from someone in the audience. Not angry. Quite the opposite. No, not happy, either. And I wanted to revisit it because I think the answers we gave out got kind of muddled by a few misinterpretations of the question.

So, all that said… when should we give up on a project? What are the signs or benchmarks something needs to hit for us to say this is as done as it’s going to get? When is it time to drag those first 60K words to the recycle bin and start something new?

To be honest, I don’t know.

Great talk, everyone! Glad you keep checking in on the ranty writing blog. So informative, I know.

I don’t know because this is something absolutely nobody can decide but you. If anyone tries to tell you that you should quit, feel free to ignore them. Tell them I said to ignore them, then go back to ignoring them. I don’t care who they are. Your writing instructor, your significant other, your family member, some professional with a pile of credits, that loudmouth guy online with no credits. I don’t care who they are. Seriously, nobody decides this but you.

Got it?

Okay then. With that in mind… let’s talk about a few reasons I might be thinking about giving up on this short story or screenplay or novel or long form epic poem. I think it usually comes down to four things. Each of these is kind of an umbrella, and it won’t surprise you that there can be overlap.

First is that I’m stuck. Could be a character thing, a particular interaction, or maybe a description. Maybe I just don’t know how to get from point L to point M, even though I had it all outlined. It just doesn’t work for some reason. Or maybe I didn’t have an outline and I’ve got no idea what happens next. Maybe I’ve been stuck for a while now. Possibly a long while.

Second, closely related to being stuck, is that I’ve been polishing this thing forever. Maybe I can always see something else that needs tweaking. Maybe I show it to other people and they always see something that needs tweaking. Writing means rewriting, and I’ve rewritten this whole thing five or seven or eleven times.

Third is that… well, I’m bored with it. Maybe it’s because I’ve been stuck and beating my head against it for ages. Maybe it just doesn’t excite me anymore. I wrote all the cool bits and what’s left is kind of boring. Nobody wants to write something dull and this thing has become dull.

Fourth and finally is that maybe I’ve become a little embarrassed by it. Ashamed, even. No, not because I forgot there were racy parts when I asked my mom to read it. Okay, maybe that. But maybe because I showed it to someone and they didn’t think it was that great. Maybe they told me it sucked. Hell, maybe I asked for feedback and they just ghosted me. I mean, how bad is this manuscript? I thought it was pretty good, but I guess it’s really awful and I’ve been wasting my time…

So that’s four reasons I think most people consider giving up on a project. Let’s talk about each of them and why maaaaayyyybbeeee they don’t really matter. Or maybe they do, in this case. Again, I can’t decide this for you.

First, we all get stuck sometimes. All of us. Yeah, even pros. Yes, me too. It’s really rare that I can’t write anything, but I have absolutely hit times when I just can’t make this sound right or that bit just doesn’t work, no matter what I do. And sometimes it takes a while to figure it out. One thing that helped me a lot was realizing this usually happened with my first drafts and first drafts just… well, they don’t matter. They can be gloriously messy, error-filled, unfinished things with gaping holes in them. Hell, the first draft I just finished up has so many holes in it, if it was a shirt I couldn’t wear it in public. But it doesn’t matter. A first draft is that shirt you only ever wear around your home because, y’know, it doesn’t matter.

If you get stuck in a first draft… skip it. Seriously. Just leave a note to yourself in all caps or brackets or whatever and just deal with it in the next draft. That’s what the second draft is for. Looking at stuff again when you’ve had some time. You’ll have a better grasp of the characters, the plot, and the whole story, and the things that you were beating your head against before will suddenly seem a lot easier to deal with.

Speaking from a lot of experience on that one.

Second, like I just said, everything needs edits and rewrites. Anyone who says otherwise is lying to you or themselves. Possibly both. We need to clean up that first draft and then go over the second draft to make sure we didn’t make new problems when we fixed the old problems. But it’s easy for this process to become a trap. Because, yeah, there’s always going to be something else to tweak, something else that could be a little stronger, a bit smoother, and crap, I’ve been doing this so long that reference is a little dated now, isn’t it? Maybe i could come up with a better one…

I tend to do five drafts of a book and then… I’m done. I put it down. At that point I know, personally, that anything I do is just going to be stalling. There will always be something else to fix. And there’s probably always going to be another chance to fix it. So don’t get trapped rewriting the same thing over and over and over again when you could be using those skills to move on to something else. Something better.

Third, yes it sucks when writing turns into work. Yeah, that first draft is filled with energy but then… well, it’s always more fun to make the mess than to clean the mess up. Plus, let’s be honest, sometimes we’ve got this other idea bouncing around in our heads and that one is really exciting.

The truth is, if I’m just doing this for fun… punt it. Move on to something you’ll enjoy more. But if I want to do this professionally—at any level—sometimes I just need to slog through it. I can’t really do anything until I’ve got a finished, polished manuscript, and sometimes that just means… I need to finish it and polish it.

Sorry.

Fourth… this one’s probably the worst because this one can hurt. And it’s really hard to ignore something that’s causing us pain. Sometimes it’s accidental. Sometimes… yeah, it a dick who thinks they’re being funny. Worse yet, they’re openly trying to hurt us. Sometimes with the assurance that “oh, it’s for your own good” and sometimes… because they just want to hurt us.

A few things to remember when this happens. Not every story is for everyone, and I can’t be surprised when someone who doesn’t like genre X has a bunch of issues with my genre X story. Some folks are really bad at vocalizing—or honestly, even identifying—what they think does and doesn’t work in a story. Taking criticism is a skill we need to learn, and alas it’s rare to learn how without taking a few bruises.

But while I’m getting bruised, I need to remember, no matter what anyone else says… this is my story. Nobody knows how it’s supposed to go better than me. Absolutely no one can write it better than me. And definitely nobody can fix it better than I can, because (again) nobody knows what it’s supposed to be better than me.

And one of the best lessons of criticism is… sometimes we can just ignore it. It can be tough, but like I said up at the top, no matter who they are, they don’t get to make the decisions.

So anyway… there’s four reasons you might want to quitting on a project. And four reasons you might want to reconsider quitting. Y’know, if you want to. And even if you do, quitting doesn’t mean deleting all your files and burning all existing copies. If you do decide to quit, you can still change your mind later.

Y’see Timmy, like I said above, nobody can decide if you should quit or not. But if you do, just make sure you’re quitting for the right reason.

Next time, for real, twists.

Until then, go write.