I’ll know I’ve made it when something in the books industry moves fast for me. Or, at the very least, at an average pace—I’d settle for that. So far, no such luck. Agencies and publishers seem to exist within a bubble of space that time can’t access.

Take the latest example, Publishers Weekly’s review of Dead Weight, which, happily, posted today. A lovely surprise, and I’ll get to that below, but first I must tell you how long the 150-word write-up took the reputable outlet. Not days. Not weeks. Months. And months. And months. I submitted a typo-ridden first pass of the manuscript to PW back in November of last year. If you’re counting, that’s nine months! The book’s been out for seven, for crying out loud.

About three months ago, I received an e-mail from PW that explained Dead Weight was under consideration for review. Oh, that’s cool, I thought, as any author would. After all, PW is the premier outfit for book reviews, and they’re picky about the reviews they do. To quote them directly, “Of the hundreds of self-published titles received each month, only a handful of the very best are selected for review.” Simply being chosen for a possible review therefore is something of an honor. A month or so go, I learned that they had decided to review Dead Weight, which was also a thrill. And now the review is posted.

I’ve read horror stories about PW reviews, especially as they relate to self-published authors. Words like vicious and relentless and demoralizing were thrown around in blog posts and message forums, and as a result I’ve braced for the worst. But here we are and the finished write-up is generally pretty positive. Some highlights, minus all the spoilers.

A “… gritty, cinematic post-apocalyptic thriller.”

A “… tense journey.”

“Despite some loose ends, the work will broadly appeal to fans of breathless end-of-the-world action sequences.”

The harshest criticism in the review is that the premise is “almost absurd.” Which, if you’re a cynic, yes, it’s true. In the same way that most fiction is pretty absurd. One of my favorite books of all time, I Am Legend, is about a dude who singularly battles vampires at the end of civilization. Also, you know, absurd—until you read it.

So that’s two reviews. Kirkus and Publishers Weekly. The two most reputable places out there. And Dead Weight survived. It’s a win, people. I’ll take it.

One last note about the PW review. The bulk of it is not a critique. It’s a summary. With spoilers. That shit ain’t cool. If you’re okay with that, here’s a link:

https://booklife.com/pwreview/220163

Quickie here. Sophistication went to a publisher, which had some feedback. I’ve got three weeks to respond with some significant tweaks. Working on that now. It’s more work, and I’m itching to start the next thing, but the silver lining is that I agree with all of the feedback and it’s bound to make the story better.

And–you know–hopefully it’ll land me a publisher, so there’s that.

For some time, I’ve been telling myself that my third book would be The Deep, Dark, Down, and then a strange thing happened. My friend was talking about his bum eye–long story, but dude’s got some vision issues–and inspiration struck. I jotted down a fifty-word synopsis later that night. Now I’ve got this other narrative whispering at me and it’s started to speak louder.

So I might write another book before The Deep, Dark, Down. Shit happens, I guess.

Summary. It’s mid-August now. Sophistication should be redelivered to the publisher by early September. Then I’ll start this untitled work and try to finish it in a few months.

 

I wrote a version of this post last night, and then WordPress ate it. As you can imagine, I wasn’t particularly happy about that outcome, so tonight I’m in Pages.

Anyway, Sophistication is wrapped. Kind-of-sort-of-mostly. It’s the first draft, which means that any potential agency or publishing partner will have feedback. But there’s a beginning, middle and end, and that means I’ve wrapped two novels. Hurray for me!

Dead Weight, which is about 100,000 words, took me five or six years to write.

For real.

Yeah.

Seriously.

I completed Sophistication, 120,000 words, in just under two.

If you’re scratching your head thinking, sheesh, this dude’s really goddamned slow, you have every right. Thing is, the snaillike progress had little to do with my pace and everything to do with my discipline. For Dead Weight, I would write a chapter or two and then I’d disappear into booze, video games, movies—life—for a year and a half. My momentum on Sophistication was better, but I still allowed a dozen or more monthlong lulls.

That’s not how you write books, and frankly, it’s amazing I ever finished the first one, let alone the second. What it’s taken me years to understand is that you can’t step away. If you want to be a writer, you have to write, always. Every night. Even if you feel like you’re forcing it, write. Even if you think your story sucks, write. You could be penning the most offensive trash ever conceived. That’s fine. But write.

It’s when you decide to take a day or two off from the process—and I know this from experience—that the days turn into months and even years. One evening you’ll find yourself back at the keyboard, knuckles cracked, rearing to go, and you won’t even remember what you wrote before because it’s been too goddamned long.

Anyway, deadlines help you find your discipline. Case in point, I wrote the last third of Sophistication—more than 40,000 words—in about a month and a half. If I had kept that pace all along, this novel would’ve taken me four and a half months to complete.

All right, enough about length and time. /tirade

Sophistication is an interesting book and I hope readers and listeners will enjoy it. It’s certainly been a challenging novel to write and very different from Dead Weight. For instance, DW was told from the perspective of a single character and written in past tense. Sophistication, meanwhile, unravels from the perspective of at least five primary characters (plus a ton of secondary ones), and it’s written in the present tense—which, by the way, I love. There’s an immediacy to present tense narrative that is, I think, hard to duplicate with past tense. Finally, one is dystopian fiction and the other is a lot harder to classify. Like, a shit ton harder.

So, it’s done. Now what? Good question—thanks for not asking. Well, the short answer is that I wait. The novel is in the capable hands of a major publisher now and if I’ve done my job well enough, good things will come—I’ll keep you posted. And if I haven’t, I’ll keep trying.

Speaking of, I’m planning to kick off work on my third novel, The Deep, Dark, Down, in the next week or two. (I know, write every night, but I’m between books—cut me some slack.) I’m going to do my best to practice what I preach and keep the discipline. I’d love to finish it by the time the Christmas holiday rolls around, but let’s just say it’ll be done by this time next year. That’ll still be a significant leap over my previous efforts.

Important thoughts that I need to remember.

• Dog is taunting me; he barks at me whenever I concentrate on anything; need to find a way to reestablish human dominance.
• Second novel at 110,000 words and nearly done. I hope it’s nearly done, because my deadline is 24 hours away. I’m not worried–what’s the worst that could happen? Not even God himself could fuck this up, etc. Right? [Fast forward three days, and somehow I’m in prison.]
• iPad Pro at 5% power after three hours of video-conferencing with hardcore, Leaving Las Vegas-level alcoholic friends.
• In three weeks, I join said friends in Vegas, at which time they will try to soak me in a life-giving alcohol pool not unlike the one from Cocoon.  Yes, I’m referencing Ron Howard’s Cocoon, which is the first time in human history that anybody has cited this film for anything, including his closest family members.
• It’s super hot at 1:04 A.M. in San Mateo. Normally, this area is cold and colder, so we don’t know what to make of the heat apocalypse, but surely it has something to do with zombies.
• David Bowie. He knows.
• Fortitude is a show that needs to be seen by everybody.
• Booker’s Bourbon reminds all other bourbons that they are insufficient.
• Jumanji sequel seems unnecessary. Original Jumanji also seems unnecessary.

I’m taking a break from writing to post an update on the status of–well, everything. I’m going to bullet-point this one for the sake of my time and yours:

• Somewhere down the page, it says Sophistication is coming June 15. That’s a big, sloppy lie. It’s not even done yet. What kind of person would promise such a thing and the–oh right.
• It’s almost done. That’s a writer’s promise, which means next to nothing. But I have to hand it in to a publisher July 10.
• Seriously, though, it’s almost done. I’m writing the final two chapters. Honest.
• I’m also camped out at an Elks Lodge for eight hours during each of the next four days in order to assure that I finish.

I figure I’ll be done by 110,000 or 115,000 words. Here’s proof of progress. See? Almost.

I was supposed to spend another 24 hours in my hotel room, but I just couldn’t do it. So this morning I checked out a day early and drove home.

I wrote 20,000 words in about three and a half days. Sophistication is now 95,000 words and the story is really, truly nearing the conclusion.

But I needed a break. Yesterday was particularly grueling, I think because for some reason I didn’t sleep well the night prior. And when I woke up this morning, I just knew that I needed some downtime.

So back to a thousand words a night.

I just wrote ‘blissfully unaware.’ It made sense. It completed the paragraph. Then I looked at it again and realized that I’m a gods-damned jackass.

If you’re blissfully anything, you are in a state of extreme happiness.

In this case, someone was ‘blissfully unaware’ that another person was about to suicide bomb them from a nearby skyscraper. Reads fine, right?

But stop.

Think about it.

Are you blissful as you make your way to work in the morning? Are you euphoric, smiling, singing, dancing your way across the street with a big, dumb grin plastered across your face?

Ugh.

‘Blissfully unaware’ should be banned from all books.

Matt–don’t forget.

That’s all.

7:20 p.m. as I write this and I’ve reached another milestone. Dirty screen grab from Ulysses:

Still managing 5,000 words daily, which is fantastic news. Could’ve been a shit show of wasted time and that’s thankfully not the case.

Six days ago, I posted that I had 25 days to write 25,000 words. I’ve now written 15,000 in three. And if I can keep up the pace, I’ll get to 100,000 in two more.

Again, word counts are misleading. I have a significant amount of storyline to go and I’m beginning to worry that this book will weigh in at 115,000 words or more. But regardless, this is steady progress in a relatively short amount of time. And the quality of the work feels good–although certainly readers may disagree.

Good news. Got through more than 5,000 words today. Critical, though, the threads of my narrative are converging in–hopefully–satisfying ways. If I’m doing my job, anyway. And jury’s still out on that. Sophistication now weighs in at more than 86,000 words. That’s fine–whatev. More relevant, it feels like I’m coming to the final chapters.

Unrelated, I did a search on the internet for ‘fat kids’ tonight–don’t ask. I don’t have a good explanation, anyway. For some reason, this came up.

Not sure why. Romeo (above) is not a child. Clearly. What he is, though, is the baddest ass motherfucker to ever walk this planet. Look at him! All right. I know the belly demands to be seen, but his face is up here, people. Up here! And take it in. No, really behold it. Have you ever seen such raw confidence on a dude before? To me, his face says, “I’ve seen the Big Bang and the dinosaurs and I know what quasars really are, so step the fuck off, mortal.”

Maybe it’s just me, though.

You don’t see that?

It’s happening.

My lovely wife has allowed me to bunk in a hotel for the next four days while I race to stay ahead of a deadline. I’m shacking up in San Jose’s Hotel Valencia, which is, incidentally, about 20 miles south of my house. That begs the question, what’s wrong with me? Simple answer. I need isolation. Doesn’t matter if it’s a barren cabin in Alaska, or my neighbor’s extra room, just so long as no people barge in to say hi.

Day 1 results: 4,000-plus words written.

This puts Sophistication at 81,000 words and counting. If I can continue the momentum–and I have almost no confidence in my ability to do that–I should be able to cross 100,000 words in the next five days. I’m only here for four, though, which means I’m more likely to achieve around 15,000 words, which will put me in the 95,000 range.

What’s all this mean? Almost nothing. You can’t judge a book by its word count, just as I can’t rely upon one to determine if my story will be fully told. I think 100,000 words will be sufficient. I might finish it in 95,000. I might need 115,000. By all the gods, I hope it doesn’t take me 200,000, or my hotel bills will be fiscally irresponsible.

In other highly unrelated news, Hotel Valencia doesn’t allow you to bring alcohol into your room–it prefers (singular, cuz American) that you buy it at roughly $80 per fluid ounce (note: Yelp will hear about this.) I smuggled Booker’s into my place, anyway, and so far it seems like the right choice. Also, many of today’s words have been written to Kendrick Lamar’s latest, which has no bearing on any points I might have made or intend to make. It’s just a detail for your consideration.

Will update throughout the next four days with musings that lean to happy and excited or depressed and defeated. Still a little too early to tell.