When I think about it, there’s only one part of writing that I actually enjoy – and that’s the writing part! LOL. I recently finished writing a synopsis for a proposal, and I was reminded of how difficult it is to “sell” a story in just a page. How should I articulate all the emotional, atmospheric ideas I have? That part that really makes the story, or those piece of dialogue that you wish were real, the bits where, as a writer, I wish were spoken to me by a handsome, virile male lead. One page. Just one page to get across weeks and weeks of brainstorming, contemplating, dreaming, researching… and falling in love with my characters. I worry that the higher-up in charge of reading my synopsis won’t get how deep my characters are – and how could they possibly? Maybe my characters are only so deep in my head.
Blurbs are even worse, because then you are selling a published novel to the public, in three paragraphs or less. That, let me tell you, is a skill and one I have come to admire. There’s nothing nicer than picking up a really awesome book at the bookstore, reading the back and immediately falling in love with the whole premise, before you’ve even peeled back the cover. (I am going to go off on a tangent and say…. how wonderful is that first moment of pulling back the cover on a brand new book, running your hand over that smooth, pristine paper… contemplating the wonderful possibilities that are contained within?) I fear that my own blurbs don’t encapsulate the hours that went into forming my characters, working and re-working the plot… I want my passion for words to shine through in the stories that I write. Maybe, when you get it just right, that’s your magnum opus.
Writing has been my passion all my life. I thought when I was eighteen I was good enough to be published. Nonsense, obviously, otherwise I would have been… but even then, writing those stories, I felt a sense of passion that nothing else has been able to match. Mostly because I’m not talented enough at anything else to have honed my skills. I wish I could draw, paint and play the piano, but unfortunately I was blessed with a singular talent. I think. I hope.
My point is that nothing gives me more happiness than sitting down and writing for hours, losing myself in my story, creating characters from nothing and making them into real, living entities in my mind. Blurbs, synopses and everything that makes me cut down my “masterpiece” to a few words are simply the banes of my life.
Along with editing and re-drafting… but that’s another blog post altogether!
I finished a brand spanking new novella yesterday. I realized, as I wrote the last full-stop and pushed away from my desk, that my heart was beating really fast. It has never occurred to me before that, in finishing something, my endorphins might just go into over-drive. I was excited, relieved and more than a little proud of myself. 
Rea Thomas 