Doubt

This has nothing to do with the film, besides that it might be slightly overrated. I really do dig Hoffman, though. Death comes to all of us, but he left his mark.

I write with a tremendous amount of doubt circling above my head. To be honest, it's probably more doubt than any other writer I've ever met. Back when I worked with the Pizza Sage, I asked him if he had a word count goal each day (think of it like a minimum page goal you have to write), and he said, "No. I could write ten thousand words in three hours or I could write ten. But if I write ten, you better believe it's the best ten words you'll ever read."

I don't have that at all. Every book I write is worst than the last one. Every character I create is duller, less motivated by intrinsic fears and desires. Every word I put down is inadequate. 

I'm not making this up. It's a struggle, to say the least.

I read the other day that King said he still has doubts, and the interviewer was like, "Really, bro?" He said he was scared that he wouldn't tell the story well. I think my doubt is different--it's that everyone is going to realize I'm a hack. That, indeed, all these people who write me wanting the next book are just a part of some grand conspiracy to build me up. 

It doesn't make a lot of sense, when I write it out like that, I guess. I only write this because I just finished my newest novel, Nemesis: Arrival, and I was sure that my editor would probably quit working with me once he read it. Instead, he said it was the best thing he'd read of mine yet--in so many words--and I was truly shocked. It's not until someone else reads my work that the doubt clears for a second, that the cloud I write in falls away and I can see a bit of blue sky. Until the next book starts, I suppose.

Anyways, to steal a phrase from my editor, back to the salt mines.