Being someone who enjoys creating, you are your own worse critic.
Notoriously harsh, unforgivably rude, and difficult to please. I describe myself of course. I am so close to completing my new book, so close that the fear has started setting in like damp on a wall.
This is all I have ever wanted to do, and the possibility of my work being negatively received is the hardest mountain to climb. I tell myself the storyline is interesting, my characters complex and real, my words are well written. I've certainly read worse. Yet I slow my pace, I am suddenly in no rush to finish. I dread the day I send this out into the world, only my eyes have seen this draft. Only I have absorbed it's content and it has become a part of my soul. A year of my life has been imbedded within this book, every spare minute, every other thought has been for this story.
It's been a hard year for me.
As I wrote the above sentence I paused afterwards and realised how true that statement is. It has been a difficult year in some parts. I have questioned myself and others a lot. I've met new friends but also lost some. I let someone damage my confidence. I regained my strength only recently.
I feel that a lot of last years experiences have slipped into my character and fed the book with much needed nourishment. Because I remembered this is my escape. My only way out.
Writing is my rabbit hole.
If anyone reads my book, they will touch a piece of me. They will be much more than a reader. For this book, reading it will mean that year with it's hard weeks will have been worth something.
