My 2024 Dilemma: Fiction or Nonfiction?
As 2023 closes, I debate creating new content or revisiting forgotten manuscripts
Hello, my dear friend.
I’ve been absent for a bit because Life on Peoples Court got hectic, beginning in November when bronchitis kicked me in the pants for about half the month. The result of those two weeks of unmotivated, distracted, nonproductive sickness was only writing about 7,000 of the 50,000 words needed for National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo).
However, I have continued to work on the book I’ve slugged Adair and Julian. I’d like it to not become yet another manuscript I haven’t finished (or that I’ve finished and haven’t edited)—my files contain plenty of those.
My neglected manuscripts include:
The Auger Road; 52,199 words; complete.
Prequel to The Auger Road; 1,970 words; incomplete (a subplot that would weave into The Auger Road).
Light; 50,151 words; complete.
Dark; 50,829 words; complete.
Run; 18,319 words; incomplete.
Pleasant Valley; 43,976 words; incomplete.
NaNoWriMo 2021 (untitled); 2,844 words; incomplete.
The Desk; 2,641 words; incomplete.
Adair & Julian; 6,604 words; incomplete.
The Nest Makeover (nonfiction); 56,711 words; complete/incomplete (I can’t decide), so I started The Nest Makeover–Starting Over; 2,515 words; incomplete.
That’s a lot of words, and each one has part of my soul woven into it, even if the finished ones need massive editing as all first drafts do, leaving them dormant for years. The incomplete ones—especially Peaceful Valley—hit plot points that I didn’t know how to resolve so, of course, I abandoned them.
For decades if anyone asked what I wanted to do with my life, I’d tell them I wanted to write books. But being a lifelong journalist and freelance magazine writer, I convinced myself that fiction “just wasn’t my thing,” despite desperately wanting to compose masterpieces like my favorite authors—John Steinbeck, Margaret Atwood, Jennifer Weiner, Lisa Jewell, John Irving, Emily Henry, Kristin Hannah, and many others.
As I read book after book by these writers and others, imposter syndrome told me I could never create such beautiful stories. However, the yearning to do so has only become stronger, even though I’m creatively torn between fiction and nonfiction.
I launched Life on Peoples Court almost a year ago (under a different name) with pure intentions—I would write for me, and I wouldn’t worry about the numbers.
As often happens, the numbers started to haunt me. And then the unexpected exposure scared me as people in real life mentioned Life on Peoples Court, and I realized all the vulnerability I share with you could also be seen by work contacts who are searching for information on me.
I don’t share about my work life here, because I want to keep my professional and personal worlds separate, but I suppose that really doesn’t happen if you release your life and soul into cyberspace. Being confronted in a work meeting with that realization caused me to hit the censor button (even though the comments were favorable), and I struggled with relevance, authenticity, and vulnerability like I hadn’t before. So I stopped writing.
I don’t want that to be me and what I represent. I write to be authentic and vulnerable and relevant so others might see and feel that they are not alone. I write to connect with people, and I share more than I probably should, because secrets and trauma breed in darkness.
I have enjoyed and appreciated interacting with you in this space, and I want to continue to do so. That said, I also need to take a step back and make sure I’m writing to you for the right reasons, not for the numbers or to build a platform. I don’t want to compare what I’m doing to others on social media and then convince myself that I’m irrelevant or insignificant.
So, I’m gonna take a break and return to my fiction manuscripts. That doesn’t mean I won’t share an occasional letter with you, but I am releasing myself from my oppressive self-imposed obligation of constant content creation.
Thank you for meeting me in this space, and please continue to do so when I show up. I also hope you’ll continue to share book suggestions with me. The best books I’ve read have come from your recommendations.
As I close, here are the books I’ve read the past few months:
It Ends With Us by Colleen Hoover
The Storyteller by Jodi Picoult
One True Loves by Taylor Jenkins Reid
All Your Perfects by Colleen Hoover
The Summer I Turned Pretty by Jenny Han
The Boys from Biloxi by John Grisham
Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing by Matthew Perry
Invisible Girl by Lisa Jewell
And if you’d like to make sure you don’t miss future letters, please subscribe, because I plan to remove myself from social media in 2024. Subscribing is free and I promise not to spam you. Be well.
Hurry back and good luck with your fiction!