I've Discovered a Gold Mine

As most of you know, I'm working on my first novel. It is a delightful, laborious process--full of self-loathing, failure, and delicious triumphs. I have been working on this thing for about three years, and very seriously for about a year and a half. I started a journal for my novel last May, just to keep track of how much time I was really spending and to make notes along the way (more for a history than as a tool to help me with the book).

On May 2, 2007 I had 99 pages written and I was in the process of re-writing those 99 pages; today, I have 259 pages of manuscript. Oh, and when I got to page 237, I went back and rewrote everything again! Still, I am forging on. When I write, "The End," I'll go back and write a new chapter to open the book, and re-write (again) the first sixty pages, which I still don't like. It would only be then, when I could begin my second draft. You see why this can be so hard? Especially for a first-timer who is writing in first-person present tense.

All this preamble is to say that I have discovered a gold mine in the Barnes and Noble "Meet the Writers" podcasts. These 15-minute talks are incredible. They are very relaxed and fluid, but contain inspiration and casual details on how the best-known writers of today write. It is also a thrill to hear some of my favorites talk candidly about their books. I'm addicted, having listened to 18 of them since Friday. Steve Bertrand (who is this guy, and why is he so familiar?) hosts. You can find the podcasts in iTunes by searching "Barnes and Noble."

My favorite dialogues so far: David Sedaris, Ken Follett, Garrison Keillor, Joyce Carol Oates, Jacquelyn Mitchard, Stephen L. Carter, Michael Chabon, Henry Winkler, and Julia Glass. Of those, I've only read: Sedaris, Keillor, and Carter. I'm very interested in reading all of them, particularly Mitchard, after these interviews.