Freak out time...

I had one of my emotional downturns, now that this draft of APoS is done. Telling myself it's a mess. That it's got too much going on yet is still shallow and doesn't reflect the time period or the people of Derry. On and on, starting as I went to bed, last night, and keeping me half-awake. Kind of rough and sent me spiraling into depression.

So I woke up, irritable, and decided I'd run some errands -- bank, PO, buy Christmas cards and a few groceries, pick up a prescription, face he insane traffic of Black Friday -- instead of anything else. That helped minimize my tendency to tear myself to pieces.

What also helped put me back on the road to control was, on a whim I went to Talking Leaves Book Shop to get my cards. I prefer those that are unusual and found a great set that will do nicely. But I also found a new translation of Miguel de Cervantes' Don Quixote, done by Edith Grossman. It's been years since I even tried to read that book and I only got through part of it, but the first pages of this one caught me so I got it.

It reminded me of how I hadn't liked Gone With the Wind the first two times I tried to read it. And how I'd found War and Peace to be thick and dull the first time in my first attempt at that. But both of these were solid works of literature that have lasted, and both of which I did like when I tried, again, to read them at later points in my life. Now W&P (and Anna Karenina) are two of my favorite all-time books, despite Russia's current atrocities in Ukraine.

Then I recalled how John Fowles, who's not exactly a lightweight literary author, published a revised version of The Magus in 1977, 12 years after it was first published and despite it having received critical and commercial success at the time. Those memories led me to one where Rob Reiner, who directed The Princess Bride, which was a huge success, supposedly went to William Goldman years after the movie was out and told him that he had shot one scene all wrong and had just figured out the right way to do it.

It's kind of silly, I know, but these snippets helped get me back on track. If John Fowles and Rob Reiner are second guessing themselves, I shouldn't be so freaked out that I am, too.

Tomorrow, I'm starting on a full outline of the three books as they currently stand. I think I'll need that to show a potential agent. It will also help keep me on track and consistent with the characters and story. I think I have Brendan, Colm, Danny, Paidrig, Eamonn and the rest set up properly...but I probably have more work to do on his mother to make her motives more settled. But that's fine. Feedback is coming.

So now I'm also going to read all of Don Quixote, to the end.