I was looking through all the back pile of manuscripts I have. A few are from writers who have gone on hiatus or have probably given up their task of finishing their great American novel.
I never admonish anyone for not finishing their manuscript as I might be the biggest culprit of that in the literary world.
For the most part I am very busy but with other things that keep me from working on my own works. The paper and clients and other things seem to have pushed my own writing not only to the back burner but all the way off the stove. And so it appears I have several probably-never-to-be-completed books that will disappear along with me someday.
I have a pile of words on military life in the 60s that looks like it will never be done. For the most part it is humor and takes the stories of a half-dozen soldiers I knew during those days and melds them into one GI who has a crazy and zany two year tour of duty during the Viet Nam War. I am fairly certain I will never get this one done.
There is another on the year 1850 in central Illinois that is a hobby for me. In that year the region we live in was almost a jungle but for the brave souls who whittled it into a thriving area of small towns and cities. It too will probably have its completion in another lifetime as the work takes traveling and research and I have little time for either right now.
I have a religious/science fiction book that I'm sure I could write in just a few months if I ever had a few months free time to do it. After all, the outline is 20,000 words so that should give me a good running start at writing it. It is the story of a man so perfect that people are fooled into thinking he is the second coming of Christ. Even Lucifer is convinced and demands a showdown. The only problem is the man is perfect but he isn't God and that causes a great many tough, personal conflicts in his life as well as everyone else's in the world. The possibility of finishing this book is almost as remote as me writing a perfect novel.
During the last two years I have another dozen or so stories that would have been included in my Portions of a Life if I hadn't got that one out till now. It wouldn't make sense to add them and try publishing again since few who bought the first would buy a second that only had about 50 fresh pages added. I think I will do this additional work on a disk and leave it at that. In a way, that will make that book complete: until I write something else that should be included and then it will be unfinished again. I sense I won't win on this one, unless I kick the bucket and that won't sit well with me: I think.
I have a joke book called The Funniest Things I ever said: Although I don't Remember When and that has the most promise.
Over the last several years I have written down those zanies I have said on the radio or when speaking and all I have to do is go through some 3000 articles and glean out the sentence or two that is a goofy quip and that book is done.
It would be a bathroom reader type of book and since I love those kinds of book I think that one has the best chance of any of them although still not very likely.
Maybe I could have that book printed on a toilet paper product. That way if someone doesn't like a page, they can tear it out and use it for something else. From time to time, someone told me to do that with something I wrote so why not give that same option to the reader?
Freelance writer, columnist, author and writing coach, ex-Chicagoan Mike Fak presently resides in Central Illinois. More information about Mike's services are available at his home website www.mikefak.com
Mike currently writes primarily humor columns for searchwarp bi-weekly and is the managing editor of www.lincolndailynews.com
Mike now offers a 26,000 word e-book on making money as a freelance writer for only $10.00 at this page. http://www.mikefak.com/id45.html
"Maybe I could have that book printed on a toilet paper product. That
way if someone doesn't like a page, they can tear it out and use it for
something else."
Fak, make sure to include that in The Funniest Things I ever said. Love it! I also enjoy Portions of a Life, too. I plan to use it as a fundraiser this year for our Home for pregnant teens.
No pressure but it would be a gift to readers everywhere if you were able to finish some of those books. I echo Dianne, "Wow!" So, don't say 'never'. :)
Thanks Avis. I will include that line. Good luck with all you do. I know you have a great heart. Maybe someday we will meet at the first annual Searchwarp convention.
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