Of Ice and Men

I learned a lot over the past months as I worked on Breakout Play . My life has been full of ups and downs so far in 2016, which has affected my writing time. And then, when I sat down to write, I struggled with getting the words out of me. Since I'm a relentless perfectionist, I wanted the first draft to be, well, perfect. I wanted every sentence to be well-crafted and full of detail. So of course I painstakingly agonized over every. single. word. The prose didn't flow; it trickled slowly onto the page. Once it was finished, I sent it out to my critique partner and beta readers for notes and comments. They pointed out what they thought didn't work and what worked, and I dove back into my draft to make it better. To make it the book on your eReaders today. That's when it hit me: being a good writer isn't in writing a good first draft. No, being a good writer means being able to craft the story over the course of several  drafts. Writing a first draft is li...