the first forty

Not to be presumptuous, but today I completed my fortieth novel.  And while I could get hit by a bus tomorrow (or later today, one never knows), I'm thinking there might be another forty or so stories waiting for their moment.  I have the ideas, that's not an issue.  Time is fleeting, speeding at a rate that makes me dizzy.  2012 is right around the corner, but For God And Country is done.  My ninth manuscript this year, forty overall.  So maybe another thirty or forty are out there, waiting to slip through my fingers.  After the last five years I've had, anything can happen!

It's been five years since I started writing fiction, really getting my feet wet.  But since the summer of 2009, well, let's say a downpour has fallen; more than half were written starting with The War On Emily Dickinson to the most recent addition.  What does this mean?  Well, on the outset, it stems from receiving supportive feedback from my stint in the 2009 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award competition.  Nothing like hearing good things to spur the muse.  Yet, something else, a deeper purpose; suddenly ideas were flying left and right, and the time, oh my, how the time was utilized!  Twenty-seven first drafts have been crafted from August 2009 to today, the twenty-ninth of December 2011.  Three of those have been indie published, several won't see the light of day.  The bulk, well, many will be released in the coming years, as will some previous to that wordy explosion.  From where it comes, I don't question.  Like the old saying goes, when God says jump, don't ask how high.

Don't ask, for two reasons; one is that you wouldn't believe it if he told you.  The other is if you knew and accepted it, a barrier would be set, a ceiling placed over your head.  But if it's all unknown, well, anything can happen, the possibilities are endless!  If after that contest in 2009, if you had told me I'd set on this course, from all those drafts to going indie, hah!  I'd would have laughed myself silly.  Who could write that many tales, who wants to stray from the comfortable, if not dodgy, path of traditional publishing?  Without any idea of how far and to where, I just took each step, holding to the knowledge anything was possible.  And I mean anything.

What else does this mean?  It means don't stop writing.  Don't let anyone or anything deter you, even if the edges are fuzzy, the center at times unstable.  If you have faith, some or any, hold to that.  Let the dream lead you on an unbelievable, beautiful road.  With forty novels written in five years and five manuscripts published, I can rightly say the only thing to prevent your dream is fear.  Whatever writing means to you, in any form, don't be afraid.  Let those fingers, stories and dreams fly!