Writing a book is difficult.
Except, sometimes, it isn’t the most difficult part.
Sometimes the hardest bit comes when the writing is finished.
I have a folder on my computer called Pending.
It is not a literary graveyard. At least, I sincerely hope it isn’t.
But sitting inside it are several manuscripts at various stages of completion. Some need another edit. Some need decisions to be made. Others are tantalisingly close to being ready for publication.
And occasionally I open that folder and think: Come on. You’re nearly there.
Because it can feel as if someone has run 25 miles of a marathon and then, with the finishing line almost visible, quietly wandered off for a cup of tea.
There are all sorts of reasons why it happens.
Money is an obvious one.
Writing and publishing a book professionally costs money, whether that is spent on ghostwriting, editing, proofreading, design, typesetting, printing, marketing or some combination of them. Circumstances change. What seemed affordable twelve months ago may suddenly not be.
Then there is time.
Jobs get busier. Families need attention. Health intervenes. Houses move. Relationships change. Life, basically, does what life has always been extremely good at doing: getting in the way of our carefully constructed plans.
And sometimes people simply fall out of love with the idea.
That book which once burned inside them no longer burns quite so brightly. Perhaps writing it scratched the itch. Perhaps getting the story onto paper was enough. Publication, once the great ambition, becomes less important.
That is perfectly legitimate.
There is another possibility as well.
Sometimes a client and I have simply gone as far together as we are going to go.
That isn't something I find offensive. By their nature, many working relationships are relatively fleeting anyway and, like any other relationship, sometimes they simply have a natural lifespan. A client may decide they want a different editor, a different publisher or simply a different direction.
Equally, I may occasionally feel that I have taken a project as far as I usefully can.
No drama. No slammed doors.
Thank you very much. It has been a pleasure.
Good luck with whatever comes next.
And, increasingly, there is another reason.
AI.
Why continue paying a ghostwriter or editor when technology apparently offers the prospect of writing an entire book yourself, for virtually nothing, and possibly before lunch on Thursday?
There is an irony here. People who suggest that I might have written something using AI tend to overlook one rather obvious point: if a piece of work took me six to eight months to complete, you can be about as certain as you can be about anything that it wasn't written by AI.
But I understand the attraction with AI.
I really do.
Whether what emerges is actually your book — carrying your voice, experiences, personality, peculiarities, humour and humanity — is another question entirely.
But that is a discussion for another day.
Whatever the reason, though, I admit I find abandoned or indefinitely postponed manuscripts disappointing.
Personally, because I become invested in the books I work on and in the people whose stories I help to tell.
Professionally, because there are some potentially very good books sitting in my Pending folder.
Books that deserve readers.
Books that are perhaps only one final push away from becoming the thing their authors originally dreamed about holding in their hands.
And that is the peculiar thing about writing a book.
Until it is published, there is no finishing line.
A completed Word document isn't really the end. In many ways it is the beginning of another process altogether.
There are decisions to make.
Editing. Proofreading. Covers. Formatting. Publishing routes. ISBNs. Printing. Distribution. Marketing.
None of it sounds quite as romantic as announcing, “I'm writing a book.”
But it is what turns a manuscript into a book.
And perhaps that explains why people sometimes stop.
For months, even years, the objective has been to write the thing. Then suddenly that enormous task has been completed and another collection of unfamiliar ones appears immediately behind it.
It can be daunting.
So this is a gentle message to anyone who has a manuscript sitting somewhere gathering digital dust.
Mine or anybody else's.
It is never necessarily too late.
If we worked together on something and it stalled six months ago, twelve months ago or longer, there is absolutely nothing wrong with getting back in touch and saying:
“Shall we have another look at it?”
Of course, restarting a dormant project can mean some additional work. Time moves on. Facts may need updating. Chapters may benefit from another read. Circumstances — and occasionally the author themselves — may have changed.
But none of that means the original work was wasted.
Quite the opposite.
You have already done the difficult bit that millions of people who say, “I'd love to write a book one day” never actually do.
You started.
And, in some cases, you very nearly finished.
Perhaps all that remains is to walk those last few yards and cross the line.
Because there are books sitting in my Pending folder that I would dearly love to move somewhere else.
Into a folder marked Published would be rather nice.
