How to Stop Throwing the Set

Does anyone know how to rise above and get back to work? Plus, another summer salad

This morning I had a coffee with a feature film writer/director to pick his brain about a new, exciting job I have this summer. I get asked to have coffee for advice quite a bit, yet I rarely ask others for the same in return. I’m trying to seek out mentors and community lately. It was really helpful. I got back in my car to drive home, and it was 33 degrees, and as I pressed my face against the AC grid I thought about his wisdom on character building for feature films.

I’m having a transition week, trying to move from my novel in progress and into a feature film. The film is what I’ll be devoted to for most of the summer. The novel is still simmering in my brain, and won’t really let me go, but I have to put it away until August, when I’m waiting on script notes. I had ten minutes yesterday between a meeting and my friends arriving from out of town, and I used all ten to revise the novel. Sometimes revisions feel more intensive than the early free drafts, it’s harder for me to sink into rewrite mode. Once I’m in I don’t want to let it go.

It’s so much better to be creating than promoting. But the publicity beat is better than the stage where you are waiting for feedback, or trying to sell a book or show. I’ve been lulling in that stage of things for a while on the screen side of things. In stand-up comedy there’s a term for when you are on stage bombing so you just decide to “throw the set” - get mad at the audience, start addressing them, talk about how badly you are bombing. I’ve had some years where I was doing the equivalent in my literary career, just kind of talking in a very straightforward way about how I felt as though I was no longer succeeding.